After watching the film at his village Ralegan Siddhi on Tuesday, Hazare had reportedly said that a person is left with no option but to slap when his power of tolerance of corruption runs out. “Because of my comment on slapping I am being portrayed as a ‘big criminal’ without giving a thought to the context in which I had said it or what I was trying to convey. This is unfortunate,” said Hazare, accusing a band of politicians of conspiring to defame him.

“I have been fighting this battle against corruption. During this battle I have never slapped anybody.... I have never advised anybody to do so nor will I slap anybody in future... what I said after watching the film was that a common man victimised by injustice and atrocities is left with no option but to slap them,” he said.

He said he should not be compared with Mahatma Gandhi. “I have said this before that I am not fit to be compared to Mahatma Gandhi. Gandhiji included use of harsh words in his definition of violence,” he wrote in the blog, titled “Still my name is associated with the slap”. “But I have used harsh words many times for people who have betrayed the nation and society, which I know was in the interest of the nation and society but would have been categorised as violence in the opinion of Gandhiji.”