MANGALURU: On Friday morning, three social workers confronted Mahesh Vikram Hegde, founder of website Postcard News, at Mangaluru International Airport and urged him to sing ‘Vande Mataram’ to prove his ‘Indian-ness’.
A video of this incident has gone viral on social media. The incident reportedly occurred around 8:15am Friday. Karnataka Congress spokesperson and social worker Kavitha Reddy, along with two student activists, spotted Mahesh while he was waiting to board a flight to Bengaluru.
Kavitha told TNIE, "We were to board an IndiGo flight from Mangaluru. On spotting Mahesh, we approached him and started asking questions politely. It was just a normal conversation. He was smiling for a while, but then he called someone to rescue him from the situation, and fled within less than 10 minutes into the conversation."
She added, "He abuses everyone through his website. He heckles and abuses women on TV shows. He once tweeted that those who cannot sing Vande Mataram are anti-nationals. So, we wanted to give it back to him politely."
Student social activists Amulya Leona and Najma Nazeer, who were with Reddy, also confronted Hegde. In the video, they can be heard questioning Hegde, “At what time did Godse kill Gandhi? Do you remember?” “You have been torturing us on Facebook,” one of the women can be heard saying.
Najma Nazeer criticises Hegde, saying that his website spreads fake news. It may be recalled that Hegde has been arrested twice earlier for allegedly spreading fake news. She also told him that the country’s youngsters are losing their lives as they are falling for propaganda. This comes just days after comedian Kunal Kamra heckled editor-in-chief and co-founder of Republic TV Arnab Goswami aboard an IndiGo flight. When TNIE tried to contact Hegde for his comment, he remained unavailable.