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‘Let them have that fear’: DMK after BJP deletes controversial Periyar tweet
The tweet came on the Dravidian icon’s 46th death anniversary when it is customary for leaders of various parties to pay tributes to either his statue or portrait to display their affinity to social justice.
The BJP in Tamil Nadu was caught on the wrong foot with allies and opponents alike on Tuesday after it posted a tweet denigrating rationalist social reformer ‘Periyar’ EV Ramasamy over his second marriage with a woman, who was much younger than him.
The tweet came on the Dravidian icon’s 46th death anniversary when it is customary for leaders of various parties to pay tributes to either his statue or portrait to display their affinity to social justice.
The Bharatiya Janata Party, for which Periyar’s ideology remains an insurmountable hurdle to find a foothold in the state, seemed to ridicule the leader of the non-Brahmin movement as one who is culpable of child abuse in the tweet.
“On this anniversary of Maniammai’s father, EV Ramasamy, let us take a pledge to support capital punishment for child sex abuse crimes and resolve to build a society devoid of POCSO (Protection of Children from Sexual Offences Act) criminals,” read the tweet in Tamil.
It also had an old photograph of Periyar and Maniammai.
The allusion to Periyar as the father of Maniammai was to indicate the huge age gap between the two. Periyar was 70 and she was 32 when they got married and it is said to be the reason behind the leader’s lieutenant CN Annadurai breaking ranks from the Dravidar Kazhagam (DK) and launching the DMK.
No sooner the tweet was posted, there was a huge backlash on social media forcing the IT wing of the Bharatiya Janata Party to delete it.
However, the damage was done as it had gone viral.
Even allies of the National Democratic Alliance (NDA) like the ruling AIADMK and the Pattali Makkal Katchi (PMK) apart from the principal opposition DMK and MDMK of Vaiko slammed the BJP for the ‘obnoxious’ post.
Firing the first salvo, state cooperation minister Sellur K Raju said whoever makes any comment insulting and denigrating Periyar deserves condemnation.
“Belittling Periyar is unacceptable. It is due to the service of leaders like Periyar, Anna (CN Annadurai) and Kalaignar (Karunanidhi) that the people of the state are living like brothers and sisters. Whoever insults them will be condemned by the Dravidian movement,” he said while speaking to reporters in Madurai.
Describing the tweet as a ‘jaundiced view’ of the BJP, PMK’s founder S Ramadoss condemned it as ‘inappropriate and disgusting’.
“It is highly condemnable and the post is a proof of the jaundiced view of the BJP and its IT Wing,” he said in a tweet.
Registering his strong condemnation, the DMK’s president MK Stalin said the very fact that the BJP had to remove the tweet from its Twitter handle shows that the party cannot play with fire.
“Even after he is long dead, Periyar continues to rattle them. The instant backlash has forced the BJP to delete the tweet. Let the BJP have that fear,” he said in a tweet.
Stalin also asked whether the ruling AIADMK would stand up at least now against the BJP.
MDMK leader and DMK ally, Rajya Sabha MP Vaiko, demanded a public apology from the BJP.
“The post on the BJP’s official Twitter handle is so demeaning that I can’t even repeat it. They have insulted Periyar with a false tweet. And they should tender a public apology,” Vaiko demanded after paying floral tributes to Periyar statue in Chennai.
This is not the first time that the BJP has faced the ire of the political parties in Tamil Nadu for deprecating Periyar.
Earlier, the BJP’s national secretary H Raja was hauled up for saying that the Dravidian leader’s statues would soon vanish from the state.
