After a Periyar statue was vandalized on Tuesday evening in Tirupattur, Vellore, miscreants desecrated a statue of BR Ambedkar in Tiruvottiyur, Chennai, with red paint on Thursday.
According to the Tiruvottiyur police, at 7:00 am, the statue, which is Grama Street, opposite the market in Tiruvottiyur, was seen with red paint splattered all over it. The perpetrators, said sources, managed to escape before the police could reach the site.
A complaint has been registered with the Tiruvottiyur police and the investigation is on.
The incident comes barely two days after two miscreants vandalized a Periyar statue in Vellore district, breaking the spectacles and nose of the statue. The act of vandalism was allegedly inspired by a Facebook post by BJP leader H Raja, which celebrated the toppling of a Lenin statue in Tripura after the party’s victory in the state. His post called for the razing of Periyar statues in TN.
The perpetrators, Muthuraman, a BJP man who was expelled from the party following the incident, and Francis, of the CPI, were immediately arrested by the Vellore police.
The act of vandalism, however, fired off massive protests in Tamil Nadu with clashes witnessed between students and police in Madurai over demands to arrest H Raja for his comments. Protests also broke out in Anna Salai and other parts of Chennai.
Further, petrol bombs were also hurled at the BJP office in Coimbatore by members of the Thanthai Periyar Dravida Kazhagam (TPDK) in Coimbatore.
Following protests, H Raja distanced himself from the post and claimed that it was put out without his knowledge by an admin. Nonetheless, he faced severe criticism both from the public and political sphere.