With its new format, Fahad Mustafa’s popular gameshow Jeeto Pakistan has been the hub of much celebrity activity of late. That, of course, is in no small measure to its stellar lineup of team captains such as Adnan Siddiqui and cricketer Sarfaraz Ahmed, among others.
The two, who head the Lahore Captains and Quetta Knights teams respectively on the show’s PSL inspired format, were in the spotlight yesterday with some interesting verbal duels that attracted much attention. And not entirely for the right reasons, might we add.
Adnan and Sarfaraz are team rivals in the show’s many competitive contests, so naturally, some amount of verbal tussling is expected, as happens on the cricket pitch too. However, the line between tongue in cheek back and forth and tense, harsh exchanges can be pretty blurry.
Facing each other off, the Meray Paas Tum Ho actor and the former national cricket team captain seemed to be getting into some volatile exchanges, with Adnan Siddiqui going as far as to ‘mock’ Sarfaraz’s stuttering, according to the feedback from social media.
The whole affair set microblogging platform Twitter on fire, with Adnan Siddiqui being the top national trend for quite some time on Wednesday. Twitteratis called out what they felt was an inappropriate way to deal with a speech disability, using terms such as ‘insensitive’ and ‘ugly.’
Some drew attention to Adnan’s recent apology over what he felt were comments made in poor taste by Amir Liaqat, on another show, and others chose to express their displeasure quite vociferously.
This is in very poor taste and disrespectful to everyone with a speech impediment.
— Paul (@mrithejester) May 6, 2020
Some were quite angry and outraged…
ADNAN SIDDIQUI IS CANCELLED. https://t.co/71oq4Ehtw8
— M (@__maheeeen) May 6, 2020
https://twitter.com/ayeshazebabbasi/status/1258095913047855104
Shameful! Disrespectful! This guy @SarfarazA_54 is winner of two ICC trophies and to my knowledge the only guy with this record in Pakistan, show some respect!
— Wajeeh (@Khanlove_123) May 6, 2020
The conspiracy theorists made sure to add their two cents.
Just cheap TRP of ARY, now I think the incident happened earlier with AL was also a preplanned one.
— Faisal (@FHASEEN) May 6, 2020
A few even decided to wax philosophically…
Sigh
— Saadia Ahmed (@khwamkhwah) May 6, 2020
What do you think? Does Adnan Siddiqui deserve the harsh feedback he has received from Twittersphere? Is all this worthy of the scandal it’s being made out to be? Let us know in the comments below!