Indian cricketer Hardik Pandya on Wednesday issued a statement of apology after some of the comments he made on celebrity talk show Koffee With Karan were slammed on social media for being “misogynist”, “sexist” and “racist”.
The popular talk show, hosted by Bollywood producer and director Karan Johar, was first aired on Sunday. Pandya, who appeared on the show along with fellow India cricketer KL Rahul, was asked a number of questions about his personal life, especially regarding his relationships with women.
Three days after the show was first aired, Pandya took to Twitter to issue an apology in which he said that he “got a bit carried away with the nature of the show”.
Here is Pandya’s full statement:
The statement came after Pandya was slammed on Twitter for “objectifying women” and being “unapologetically misogynistic”. Here are some of the tweets criticising Pandya’s comments:
However, the Board of Control for Cricket in India is not satisfied with the apology, according to a report in the Hindustan Times.
“This attempt at an apology does in no way bring the issue to closure,” the newspaper quoted an unnamed BCCI official as saying. “This merely shows how lightly he takes the gravely serious issue of respecting women.
“His conduct was unacceptable. He needs to understand the impact the utterances of an international cricketer have in this country but more importantly he needs to learn how to differentiate between the right and the wrong.
“Right now he seems to merely respond to the outrage and not to his own thought process and conduct,” the official added.
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