After Samajwadi Party MP Shaifur-Rehman Barq and All India Muslim Personal Law Board, Urdu poet Munawwar Rana came out in oblique support of the takeover of Afghanistan by Taliban.
While speaking to a news channel on Thursday, Rana said that he believed that Taliban had done no wrong by taking over the control of Afghanistan and they had actually liberated their country.
He also claimed that Taliban were not terrorists but they could be called “aggressive”.
The 68-year-old poet also said that India had no reason to worry about the Taliban in Afghanistan and said, "If you look at the history, Afghans have never done anything bad to India and hence India should not be afraid of the Taliban. There was not much happening in that country, but not a single incident where any Indian was harmed by any Taliban or Afghan was reported."
Slamming the United States for their 20-year occupation of Afghanistan, Rana said, "Only the Afghans know how they have spent the last 20 years. For Americans, killing a human being is like killing an ant and they do not care."
When asked about the Taliban's act of destroying Buddha statues in Bamiyan, the poet asked, "Yahan Ram mandir banane ke liye masjid tod diya...usko kya kahiyega ? Was that not sacred?"
Rana was recently in controversy when he said that if Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath returned to power next year, he would be forced to leave Uttar Pradesh.