A statue of Tamil icon and social activist EV Ramasamy, famously called Periyar, was found to be vandalised by unidentified men near Aranthangi in Pudukkottai district of Tamil Nadu.
As per the latest reports in the incident, the police has started investigating the case, and keenly looking for the miscreants responsible for the act.
This is not the first time that the statue of Periyar was attacked. Last year in March, his bust was demolished in Vellore. Later that month, a jawan of the CRPF was arrested for vandalising the statue of the Dravidian movement icon. The jawan had climbed on the platform, smashed the statue’s head off and placed it near a traffic roundabout in Pudukkottai. He was traced with help of a CCTV camera installed nearby.
Periyar, who began the Self-Respect Movement and founded the first Dravidian outfits in the country Dravidar Kazhagam, is a revered figure in Tamil Nadu. His Self-Respect movement was extremely influential not just in Tamil Nadu, but also overseas in countries with large Tamil population such as Malaysia and Singapore. “There should be no differentiation amongst the people. All should be treated as equals,” he had said.
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