New Delhi: Publishing house Bloomsbury India found itself at the centre of criticism over it’s alleged announcement to invite BJP leader Kapil Mishra at the launch of a book on Delhi riots 2020. A poster with a logo of Bloomsbury India got viral on social media.
Mishra’s pro-CAA speeches allegedly incited the February 2020 communal riots in Delhi, in which over 50 lives were lost.
The online launch event, of the book Delhi riots 2020: Untold story scheduled for Saturday, 22 August, will be inviting BJP leader Kapil Mishra as “guest of honour”.
The book in question is titled Delhi Riots 2020: The Untold Story and is authored by Monika Arora, Sonali Chitalkar and Prerna Malhotra. Arora described her book on Twitter as an account of “how Jehadi-Naxal lobby planned and executed Delhi riots”.
Several Twitter users called out Bloomsbury for including Mishra in the event:
“Wow @BloomsburyIndia !! how are you inviting kapil mishra who is a literal riot instigator and nupur sharma who runs the internationally discredited hate machine called opindia to a book launch!?,” a user wrote.
Responding to the comments on social media about his role in the book launch, Mishra said: “Freedom of Expression ke thekedar ek kitab se darr gaye (the custodians of freedom of expression are getting scared of a book). Because they know this book will expose their lies and will bring the truth of Delhi riots.” He also tweeted about the event on Friday.
An unnamed representative of the publishing house told Newslaundry: “No, the authors did not inform us of this event and our logo has been used without our knowledge. We are not organising any launch event for the book Delhi Riots 2020,” the representative was quoted as saying. Suhasini Haidar of The Hindu tweeted a clarification from Bloomsbury India that while it is publishing the book, it is not organising this event.