Social media fuels the paparazzi world with likes and views. Millions scroll through celeb updates every day. Bollywood photographer Varinder Chawla recently shared how ICC blocked his account for 3 days over World Cup posts. He also thanked actor Ranveer Singh for helping out by reaching out to the ICC Chairman Jay Shah.
Ranveer Singh helps out the paparazzo with his legal woes
On Siddharth Kannan’s podcast, Varindar Chawla was asked about landing in legal trouble while maintaining a paparazzi page. Chawla shared, “Yes, it happens a lot. I got stuck badly once, my page was suspended for three days. The pages are big, touchwood, there is a good audience, so we come in everyone’s eyes quickly. There was a match… I think when we won the World Cup. The entire nation was celebrating at that time”.
Ranveer Singh and the strike incident
The paparazzo further said, “My team also took 2-3 videos of the crowd celebrating and posted them. I remember the atmosphere at that time, Anant sir’s wedding was also happening. I got an Instagram strike for three days, saying that the your page has been blocked for three days. When I went to check my mail, I got to know that the strike was done by ICC.” Recounting those terrible three days of distress, he expressed, “Your YouTube channel or page is like a shop for you..a livelihood. It felt such that someone has set your shop on fire. I went mad during those three days..I was crying and wailing, thinking what just happened. I did not commit any big mistake, the whole country was celebrating. This shouldn’t have happened.”Chawla added, “I tried a lot during those three days. I spoke to Meta about it, but there are some terms and conditions that had to be followed for those three days. My page remained on freeze and it was unblocked after three days. But, those strikes were right there. Meta told me that if you get another strike, your page will be suspended forever. Even if you make the slightest mistake, your shop will be set on fire.”
Reaching out to Ranveer Singh
During the tough time, he reached out to Ranveer for help. Chawla said, “They said that I should request ICC, only they can solve your issue. Will you believe? I spoke to so many people, tried everything, I have never asked anything from anyone, touchwood. But on that day, I requested someone to help me and that person was Ranveer Singh. He said, ‘Don’t worry, I will do as much as I can’. He helped, his team helped me.”
Ranveer Singh reaches out to Jay Shah
Singh’s team helped out by connecting Chawla to Jay Shah to sort out the issue. He concluded, “They took me to ICC. They made me send an email to Jay Shah sir. Then, I got a call from his team, from BCCI. They told me that it’s not a problem, Jay Shah sir received my mail and it’s fine, you just made a small mistake. They said that ‘We will fix it, but be careful and don’t make such a mistake again’. I did that and within 15 days, the entire matter got solved and things became clear. Ranveer Singh, then Jay Shah… despite being such big people, they helped me”.
