Kerala vlogger flying from Malappuram to Mecca apologizes after posting ‘Thank you, Modi Sir’

Remember Shihab Chhotuur, the 32-year-old vlogger from Kerala who walked from Malappuram to Mecca in Saudi Arabia to perform Haj in 370 days?

On Tuesday, he had to delete a post on Facebook in which he was expressing gratitude to Prime Minister Narendra Modi. “Thank you. Modi sir I am proud to be an Indian Muslim,” he said in his post along with a photo of himself and his two children dressed as Ram and Sita.

But, an hour after posting it, he removed the 11-word post from his page as he faced severe backlash from a large section of his over 7.71 lakh followers. He later posted a lengthy explanation as to why he thanked the Prime Minister and issued an apology for posting it without context.

“Last day, the Prime Minister had liked my post of an event organized… It went viral when many national personalities shared it. I was surprised that the PM of the country liked the post of a common man like me. So a while back, I posted this to thank him. This has nothing to do with the Ayodhya issue. Furthermore, I will never surrender to fascism. However, social media reacts in ways we cannot even imagine. Many people react without knowing this truth. Leave it to Allah. As a person who loves the beloved Prophet, I do not support fascism. I am sorry for the misleading post and I apologize to everyone who loves me,” he said in his new post.

While going to Mecca on foot, Shihab covered a distance of 8,640 kilometers through Pakistan, Iran, Iraq, Kuwait and Saudi Arabia. He hails from Valancherry in Malappuram district, he started his journey to perform Haj on June 2, 2022 and reached Mecca in June 2023.

On his holy path, Shihab passed through several Indian states before reaching the Wagah border to enter Pakistan. There, he was stopped by immigration officials because he did not have a visa and had to wait for months to obtain a transit visa. Eventually, in February 2023, he managed to obtain a transit visa and entered Pakistan to resume the journey and reached his destination four months later.