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Rant against Ram

Rant against Ram

Author: Editorial
Publication: The Pioneer
Date: September 22, 2007

Karunanidhi is inflaming passion

There's nothing startlingly original about Tamil Nadu Chief Minister M Karunanidhi's obnoxious and obscene verbal assault on Lord Ram and the Ramayan tradition; far worse sacrilegious acts have been committed in the past at the behest of the man who continues to inspire the DMK's patriarch. For, let us not forget that EV Ramaswami Naicker, who made a fetish of his claimed atheism but never quite had the guts to attack any other religion apart from Hinduism, took out a procession in 1956 with Lord Ram's picture garlanded with slippers before making an elaborate show of destroying the portrait in public. Mr Karunanidhi and others of his ilk may remember 'Periyar' for so boldly denouncing Hindu faith (without uttering so much as a squeak on either Islam or Christianity), many others remember 'EVR' as the author of The Ramayana: A True Reading, a particularly vicious and scurrilous attack on the Ramayan tradition that was published in 1959. In a sense, Mr Karunanidhi's uncalled for denigration of Lord Ram and Ramayan is an extension of his idol's vituperative denunciation of the man whom millions of Hindus, including in Tamil Nadu, consider to be Maryada Purushottam and who inspires nothing but the noblest of thoughts. What is most distressing is the uncivilised manner in which Mr Karunanidhi has sought to voice his dissenting view - it flies in the face of his claim to being a man of culture as advertised by the prefix to his name, 'Kalaignar'. Surely there's more to being 'cultured' and 'civilised' than heaping abuse on articles of popular faith. His admirers, among them our Marxists who revel in denouncing all things Hindu, are no doubt thrilled by Mr Karunanidhi's unrestrained diatribe, but the veteran politician would do well to remember that a person holding public office is expected to behave in a responsible manner.

Mr Karunanidhi has, in the past fortnight, displayed a shocking disregard for a Chief Minister to carefully weigh his words and be mindful of the consequences of his public utterances. His appalling comments on Lord Ram, the Ramayan tradition and popular Hindu faith have the potential to inflame public opinion beyond Tamil Nadu; revulsion has a tendency to manifest itself in the form of violent protest. Of course, such violence cannot be justified - the attack on the house of Mr Karunanidhi's daughter deserves unequivocal condemnation - but is best avoidable. It is mystifying as to what exactly the DMK chieftain wishes to achieve by pouring scorn on Lord Ram. He is not doing the DMK's ally, the Congress, a favour; on the contrary, the Congress and other members of the UPA will have to bear the burden of his verbal abuse in vast swaths of the country when elections are held. Even within Tamil Nadu, there is palpable resentment against his diatribe and it is not limited to the favourite hate figure of DMK politics. It is possible that Mr Karunanidhi is caught in a time warp and believes he is still living in the 1950s when Ram-bashing was a rage among 'rationalists' in that State. It is equally possible that his rant is prompted by the apprehension that the Sethusamudram Shipping Channel Project may suffer a setback in the coming days; its implications need not be elaborated. Reasons apart, it is a pity that a Chief Minister should elect to speak in such bazaar language.


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