Amid the furore over the building of a ‘pen statue’ for the late DMK patriarch Karunanidhi, the people of Tamil Nadu took the opportunity to remember the incident when Karunanidhi’s statue was razed down.
The year was 1975. Karunanidhi was the Chief Minister of Tamil Nadu. Apparently EV Ramasamy Naicker (hailed as ‘Periyar’ by his followers) was supposedly ‘impressed’ by Karunanidhi’s government and apparently ‘insisted’ on installing a statue of Karunanidhi.
Karunanidhi reportedly told EVR “Let me first think about installing a statue for you and then we will see about this.”
Accordingly, Karunanidhi installed a statue for EVR at Simpson, Chennai (just near to the present-day Omandurar Government Medical Hospital). Following this, folks of EVR’s Dravida Kazhagam undertook steps to install a Karunanidhi statue which Karunanidhi allegedly was not in favor of. But Karunanidhi couldn’t stop them.
And so, a statue of Karunanidhi sponsored by DMK’s ideological parent Dravida Kazhagam was unveiled on Mount Road in 1975 when Karunanidhi was Chief Minister! The statue was reportedly unveiled in the presence of EVR’s controversial wife Maniammai and Kundrakudi Adigal.
So, EVR and Karunanidhi had statues of themselves when they were alive and wielding power.
There would’ve been four statues of Dravidian party leaders on Mount Road (now known as Anna Salai) – EVR statue near Simpson at the beginning of Anna Road, Annadurai statue at Wallajah Road junction, Karunanidhi’s statue a few meters away from Dargah junction and MGR statue at Spencer Plaza junction.
But then, one statue earned the wrath of Tamil people when they heard that a tragedy struck them.
The day was 24 December 1987. The then Chief Minister Dr. MG Ramachandran (MGR) who the Tamil people revered as a demigod, had passed away. The entire state was drowned in sorrow.
It was the time when there were high-voltage tensions between DMK and AIADMK. A young man had climbed on the pedestal of Karunanidhi’s statue, took an iron rod and began vandalizing the statue.
GC Shekhar, a photo journalist with The Telegraph who had captured this moment recounts the incident in an interview to the Deccan Herald.
“I was walking down from my office to Rajaji Hall where MGR lay in state, and I found a young man on the pedestal on which Karunanidhi’s statue stood. He soon got an iron rod to break the statue, but he could reach only upto its waist. Immediately, a cement dustbin was rolled onto the pedestal. He climbed on it and began vandalizing the statue.” Shekhar was quoted saying in Deccan Herald.
Reacting to this incident, Karunanidhi wrote in Murasoli that he took solace in the young man stabbing him from the front and not from the backside.
There were no attempts to reinstall the statue until 2022 when a bronze statue was unveiled a few meters away from where the original statue was razed down.
This incident that has scarred the DMK is once again being recollected by opposition leaders in Tamil Nadu.
Naan Tamilar Katchi head Seeman during the public hearing meeting held by Tamil Nadu Pollution Control Board (TNPCB) on 31 January 2023 said that he would break the statue if it was built inside the sea.
This comment of Seeman which grabbed news space has sent jitters to the DMK with the party’s IT wing head and Mannargudi MLA instigating violence against those opposing the pen statue.
He had retweeted the tweet of one Isai, DMK IT Wing’s State Deputy Secretary, in which he had shared the image of a man pelting a dog.
Barking dogs seldom bite, but pelting them regularly is a must! #கடலில்பேனா_வேண்டும் pic.twitter.com/AtrM4PMZBW
— இசை (@isai_) January 31, 2023
Reacting to the venom spewed by DMK IT Wing, AIADMK Spokesperson and IT wing Chennai zonal secretary Kovai Sathyan said that history will repeat itself if the DMK proceeds with installing the pen statue.
வரலாறு திரும்பும்.
History repeats. #சிலை #பேனாவை_உடைப்போம் pic.twitter.com/kIWGk2cANJ— Kovai Sathyan (@KovaiSathyan) February 1, 2023
With the pen statue now becoming a polarising icon even before its installation, only time will tell if it will ever see the light of the day.
And if it does, will it meet the same fate of Karunandhi statue?
Click here to subscribe to The Commune on Telegram and get the best stories of the day delivered to you personally.