Last Updated: March 15, 2023, 19:53 IST
Salman Yusuff shared details about his unpleasant experience at the Bengaluru airport.
Salman Yusuff claimed that he was harassed by an immigration officer – on his way to Dubai – for not communicating in Kannada, despite being born in Bengaluru.
Choreographer Salman Yusuff Khan, in an Instagram post, has shared details about his unpleasant experience at the Bengaluru airport. Salman claimed that he was harassed by an immigration officer – on his way to Dubai – for not communicating in Kannada, despite being born in Bengaluru. He wrote: “Kempegowda International Airport – On my way to Dubai and I meet this immigration officer who speaks to me in Kannada … and I in my broken Kannada try to tell him that I understand the language but can’t speak so well.” The immigration officer – pointing towards the birthplace mentioned on Salman’s passport – asked him if he and his father were born in Bengaluru, how come he doesn’t know Kannada.
Salman told the immigration officer that he hasn’t spent a lot of time in the city, as he was raised in Saudi Arabia. And whatever Kannada he knows, it is because of his friends in Bengaluru. Next, Salman claimed that upon hearing his statements, the officer said: “If you can’t speak Kannada, I can suspect you.” The choreographer told the officer that he knows his nation’s official language Hindi and that is, as per him, enough. Salman revealed that he also asked the officer for what would he suspect him. To which, the officer said, “I can just suspect you for anything,” claimed the dancer in his video.
This angered Salman and he replied, “Try me” multiple times – each time the pitch of his volume went higher. Following this, the immigration officer kept quiet. “I told him that if uneducated people like you continue to live in this country this country will never grow …To which he just kept his head down and murmuring,” Salman added.
The dancer said that he even tried to report this incident to the airport authorities but according to him, no one seemed to help or guide him. He wrote: “Well this is what I get to represent my city and win national accolades… that I have to prove myself to these uneducated Brutes.”
Referring to himself as “a proud Bangalorean”, Salman stated that what he has faced is “unacceptable.” “You should always encourage people to learn any local language, not demean them for not knowing it .. and pulling your parents name into it,” he concluded his long note.
The authorities at the Bengaluru airport have not reacted to Salman’s claim yet.
