Odisha’s netizens slam Ram Gopal Verma for his ignorance about the state

Keywords: Ram Gopal Verma, Anubhav Mohanty, Nila Madhab Panda, Apsara Rani, Odisha, Bollywood
Bollywood filmmaker Ram Gopal Verma has become the target of Odia netizens for his ill-intended tweets on Odisha. The director recently posted some pictures of Odia girl, Apsara Rani, who is working in his next project, Thriller, and mentioned that he got to know about Odisha after meeting the girl. He mentioned that he knew about Odisha earlier for the super cyclone in 1999.

“Before meeting Apsara, I didn’t even hear about Orissa since 1999 hurricane. But after meeting her now, I realised that Orissa creates all kinds of hurricanes. It’s been great revelation that Orissa has such beauties. More power to Orissa (sic),” was one of his tweets introducing the actress. In another tweet he mentioned, “Apsara Rani is from Orissa, born and brought up in hills of Dehradun and presently lives in Hyderabad. She is an excellent dancer and a even better actor (sic).”
This didn’t go down too well with the Odia people who slammed the filmmaker for his ignorance. Many even pointed out that it’s not Orissa, the state’s name is Odisha. Along with the common people, several celebrities including national award-winning filmmaker Nila Madhab Panda and actor-MP Anubhav Mohanty also joined the chorus in pointing Ram Gopal out for his tweets.
“No one is asking for your advice sir. Google is available you should see to have more knowledge. We have great talents, one of the best in the world to fight natural disaster, u need two days to hear how serious we are (sic),” wrote Nila Madhab.
“You want to create a sensation for your forthcoming film, but there are more dignified ways to do this. I congratulate Odia girl Apsara. Refuse to believe that you are so unaware of Odisha. If this is your yardstick to know a state, you seriously need to reflect (sic),” tweeted Anubhav.