A man who raised the slogan, ‘Muthuramalimgam vazhgai’, during a public rally at Karumathampatti bus stand in Coimbatore on Tuesday, was removed from the rally premises by party cadres of the MDMK.

This incident comes after MDMK leader, Vaiko, reportedly faced black flag protests by caste groups in the Kovilpatti constituency when he went to file his nomination on Monday.

The person who shouted the slogan is said to be from a Thevar community. Muthuramalingam Thevar was a Thevar leader who went on to head the All India Forward Bloc in Tamil Nadu.

On Monday, Vaiko had announced that he will not be contesting the elections. In a press release, Vaiko said that the DMK and its Kovilpatti candidate were engineering protests against him on caste lines by recounting his support for Kausalya, whose Dalit husband Sankar was hacked to death recently. Kausalya belongs to the Thevar caste. 

Vaiko said that he was being insulted and abused for condemning the brutal murder of Sankar by caste-fanatics in Kausalya’s family.