Javed Akhtar, Tillotama Shome, other celebrities react to Russia's military operation in Ukraine

After Russian President Vladimir Putin ordered a military operation in Ukraine on Thursday, several celebrities took to social media to express their views about the ongoing crisis.

In a tweet, actor Tillotama Shome wrote that "nothing can be uglier than war."

"I worry incessantly for my mother who is battling cancer in the midst of covid. But when I think of the families and cancer patients in the middle of war, my brain just ceases to comprehend. Nothing absolutely nothing is uglier than war. Mothers don't give life for war," she tweeted.

Veteran lyricist Javed Akhtar, too, reacted to the situation.

"If the Russian / Ukrainian conflict evokes a sense of fairness n justice, a humane desire to protect the weaker in them, Why all of the western powers are totally indifferent towards Saudi carpet bombings and atrocities on a small country like Yemen," he wrote on Twitter.

"Every annexation/withdrawal of troops that push a country back into the Dark Ages/new data privacy rules, everything that'll happen now will happen to 'further democracy' and in 'national interest'.(If people don't fight for freedom, we'll be glorified serfs again)," Richa Chadha tweeted.

Putin announced the military operation via televised speech.

Defending its military action, Russia said the root of "today's crisis around Ukraine is the actions of Ukraine itself" and the Russian operation is aimed to protect residents in the eastern part of the country.

( With inputs from ANI )