Chennai (Tamil Nadu), March 07, 2018 (TMC Desk) Hours after a BJP office in Tamil Nadu was attacked, party National Secretary H. Raja on Wednesday expressed regret for his Facebook post that said statues of rationalist movement founder E.V.Ramasamy or Periyar would be razed to the ground in the state.
Early on Wednesday a petrol bomb was hurled at a BJP office around 500 km from here in Coimbatore by unidentified persons.
Later in a fresh Facebook post on Wednesday, Raja expressed his heartfelt regret for his Tuesday’s post, which he claimed was a message posted by his social media administrator without his permission and hence he had removed it.
Raja expressed regret if his post had hurt anybody’s feelings. According to him, damaging the statues of Ramasamy is not agreeable.
The message that was posted and later removed said: “Who is Lenin? What is the connection between him (Lenin) and India? What connection between communism and India?
“Lenin’s statue was broken down in Tripura. Today it is Lenin’s statue in Tripura and tomorrow it will be the statue of caste fanatic E.V.Ramasamy.”
Late on Tuesday, two persons were arrested in Thirupattur in Vellore district for vandalising Ramasamy’s statue.
The attackers at the BJP’s office in Coimbatore had come in a three wheeler and had thrown the petrol bomb inside the office. Police are investigating the case.
Who was Periyar?
Erode Venkata Ramasamy Periyar was born in 1879 in erstwhile Madras Presidency to a Kannada businessman family. He joined the Congress party but left it after he found it to be dominated by Brahmins. Much later, he started his own Dravidar Kazhagam party, which is considered the inspiration of all political parties launched later on the plank of Tamil pride.
He was a staunch opponent of Brahminism and criticised Hindu religion openly. He believed in the ideas of Tamil saint Thiruvalluvar and hence held faith in the idea of a single, formless God.
Periyar had become a widely known leader of the lower castes after his movement in 1924 that demanded entry of Dalits in temples in Kerala. He is known the most for his Self-respect Movement that aimed at generating pride in lower castes. His campaign against imposition of Hindi in Tamil Nadu is the origin of all anti-Hindi movements later in south India. He found Hindi a tool of Brahminical domination of Tamils. His most controversial movement was protests against Hindu idols. The movement involved breaking or burning of idols of Hindu gods or garlanding them with shoes.
