After facing major trolling on Monday for a post, which was seen by many as mocking Chandrayaan-3, actor Prakash Raj later clarified that he was referring to a joke of 'Armstrong times' and was celebrating Kerala's tea-makers.
"Hate sees only hate. I was referring to a joke of Armstrong times... celebrating our Kerala chaiwala... which chaiwala did the trolls see? If you don't get a joke then the joke is on you... GROW UP," the actor wrote on X. He was referring to the hate he received when several users thought by "chaiwala" he meant Prime Minister Narendra Modi.
Others also felt that the tweet -- which included a caricature of a man cooling tea by pouring it to and fro between two mugs -- is a famous joke that a Malayali can be found on the moon, with a tea stall, implying that people from Kerala are almost everywhere.
A large number of X users felt that the post was in poor taste and that it mocked the efforts of the scientists who have worked on Chandrayaan-3.
"You are mocking our scientists who put years of their lives to make this a success," an X user wrote, slamming the actor.
“#Chandrayaan3 mission is for India. Being an Indian, you should be proud of the technological progress of India. Progress over politics,” another user commented.
Another X user termed Prakash Raj’s post is “deplorable”.
Prakash Raj, 58, had contested the 2019 Lok Sabha election from the Bengaluru Central constituency as an independent candidate. He lost the seat to the BJP’s PC Mohan.
Chandrayaan-3 is India’s ambitious lunar mission making a fresh attempt to land an unmanned mission on the moon after a failed bid in 2019.
The lunar expedition follows the 2019 Chandrayaan-2 mission where space scientists are aiming for a soft landing on the surface of the moon. The Chandrayaan-2 module crash-landed on the moon's surface in September 2019. The lander, called Vikram - after the founder of India's space programme, Vikram Sarabhai - was due to touch down on the Moon, but contact was lost around 2.1 kilometres above the surface.
India seeking to become only the fourth nation after Russia, the United States and China to put a mission on the moon's surface and boost its credentials as a low-cost space power.
On Monday, ISRO (Indian Space Research Organisation) released images of the lunar far side area, captured by the Lander Hazard Detection and Avoidance Camera (LHDAC).
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