Chennai: Bharatiya Janata Party’s (BJP) Tamil Nadu Chief spokesperson Narayanan Thirupathy said on Saturday that there was no issue in singing the state song before the national anthem and the national song, asserting that the order of rendition of the three did not matter as the state is also an integral part of India.
Speaking to IANS, Thirupathy said: “Tamil Thai Vazhthu (state song), our national song and our national anthem are all equally important. Whether one is sung first, second or third does not matter. If someone wants ‘Tamil Thai Vazhthu’ to be sung first, there is no problem. Everything is our lifeline.”
“Let us not take this as an issue and create a controversy. If people want to sing it (Tamil Nadu state song) first, no problem…there should not be an issue. After all, Tamil Nadu is also an integral part of India. So, we have no problem (with the order of singing), just that it should be sung,” he added.
Meanwhile, he accused Tamil Nadu Assembly Speaker JCD Prabhakar of attempting to promote Christianity.
A controversy erupted after Prabhakar attended the 5th National March for Life, an anti-abortion rally, as a chief guest on August 8 and 9 in Chennai.
Calling out the TVK leader, BJP’s Narayanan Thirupathy said: “We have seen that JCD Prabhakar has been supportive of Christianity from the very beginning and has been trying to promote the Christian religion. There is no problem with him having faith in his religion, but in a democracy, he should not use his position to emphasise or promote his own religion.”
“That is not appropriate. I am surprised that others have not condemned this. If someone had made a similar statement about the Hindu religion, they would have been branded as communal. But why they are not doing is because they are pseudo secular,” he remarked.
Condemning Prabhakar’s actions, the BJP leader said that Chief Minister C. Joseph Vijay “should advise him not to do such things which is going to affect the TVK-led government itself”.
(IANS)
