Moral policing can't be tolerated in our lovely cosmopolitan city

Bengaluru: Kannada film actor Samyuktha Hegde and Congress leader Kavitha Reddy appeared to have buried their hatchet with the latter accepting the former's apology over alleged assault and abuse, over which police have registered a case against the politician.

A day after Kavitha Reddy tendered the unconditional apology for her actions in questioning the actress doing a hula-hooping workout at a park wearing a sports bra, Samyuktha said she accepted it and expressed the hope of moving away from the incident. On September 4,the Congress leader had allegedly assaulted the actor in the Agara Lake Park for not wearing 'decent' clothes with her outbursts seen as an act of moral policing.

The outraged actress had later posted a video of the incident on her Twitter handle. The Bengaluru police on Tuesday arrested Kavitha Reddy on charges of assaulting Samyuktha Hegde and her friends. On Wednesday, Samyuktha took to Instagram to reveal that she has decided to drop charges against Kavitha Reddy considering her age. She also added that her apology was genuine.

Here's what Samyuktha wrote in her Instagram post

"I really really appreciate all the support I've been getting, all the love, all the posts, all the trolls, all the tweets that gave this voice an amplifier. You have played such a major role in making this a nationwide impact, this is a feather on the cap for all of us as a society and I hope that the horrible incident of Friday results in a wider awareness about moral policing cannot be tolerated in our lovely cosmopolitan city or anywhere else.

Let's be clear. Kavitha Reddy's apology was not satisfactory or genuine. She had not taken down her posts or tweets for 16 hours after issuing a public apology which shows how casual she was about the apology and had clearly done this under pressure as it was affecting her public image and many of you have also pointed this out. However, I want the focus of this issue to be not on her or me or the incident. I hope this goes a small way in working a greater freedom for women everywhere around. I've consulted with my family and also keeping Kavitha Reddy's age in mind. I am not interested and don't want to pursue my case against her and I have formally requested the police yesterday about the same.

However, I want to be clear: I still hope that strong action is taken against Anil Reddy and the others with him, who threatened and abused us at the park and made us so helpless. Nobody in the world has a right to make you feel like that and it will not be tolerated anymore. ­"