Home News Annamalai’s Own Supporters Hit Back At Him For Praising Anti-Hindu EVR

Annamalai’s Own Supporters Hit Back At Him For Praising Anti-Hindu EVR

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The Commune
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Annamalai Hails Anti-Hindu EVR On His Birth Anniversary

Former Tamil Nadu BJP president K. Annamalai, who has since quit the party and founded We The Leaders, is receiving backlash from sections of his own supporters after paying tribute to anti-Hindu EV Ramasamy on his 148th birth anniversary.

Annamalai, who served as Tamil Nadu BJP president before leaving the party, posted a tribute to EVR on Thursday, 17 September 2026.

“Periyar played an important role in social reform movements and had a major impact on the social and political history of Tamil Nadu. We remember and pay our respects to Periyar’s public life, during which he spent much of his life fighting against inequalities and superstitions prevalent in society,” Annamalai wrote on his X handle.

The tribute has drawn a sharp reaction from people who had supported Annamalai during his BJP tenure, particularly because of his earlier public positions against EVR and Periyarist politics.

During his En Mann En Makkal yatra, Annamalai had made his position on EVR statues outside temples clear. When he reached Srirangam, he declared that EVR statues installed outside temples would be removed if the BJP came to power in Tamil Nadu.

Annamalai had said that statues and plaques of EVR outside temples would be removed and replaced with statues of Azhwars, Nayanmars, Tamil scholars and freedom fighters.

His criticism of EVR was not limited to statues.

On another occasion, Annamalai had dug out controversial remarks made by EVR himself to target the DMK and its ideological politics. He used EVR’s own words to ridicule the party and question its continued celebration of the Dravidianist leader.

The contrast has become even more striking given Annamalai’s earlier statements defending Tamil Brahmins.

While speaking about the treatment of Brahmins in Tamil Nadu, Annamalai had compared the persecution of Tamil Brahmins to the persecution faced by Jews, arguing that the community had faced sustained discrimination.

His latest tribute, however, praises the same EVR whose speeches and writings contained some of the most severe attacks on Brahmins and Hindu religious beliefs.

EVR had repeatedly attacked Hindu gods, religious practices and Brahmins, with his rhetoric against Brahmins including calls that have been described as advocating their extermination.

For sections of Annamalai’s former supporters, the issue is therefore not simply his decision to acknowledge EVR’s role in Tamil Nadu’s history, but the stark contrast between his present tribute and the position he himself took while leading the BJP in the state.

Here are some reactions:

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