india

Updated: Jan 21, 2019 21:21 IST

A painting exhibition put up during a two day folk and traditional art festival at Chennai’s Loyola College drew a harsh attack from the BJP and its affiliates, leading to the premier institution apologising on Monday.

In a statement, the college said that the venue for the grand cultural event has been misused and it was not intentional on its part to hurt any segment of the society.

The festival, “Veethi Virudhu Vizha” held on Saturday and Sunday was to honour folk artistes and groups from across Tamil Nadu engaged with traditional performing arts and provide them a platform to showcase their talent. However, a painting exhibition where works portrayed atrocities against women, “honour” killings, the Rafale deal among other issues, kindled right wing outrage in social media against the college.

BJP national secretary H Raja termed the exhibition as a conspiracy to defame Hinduism and demanded action against the College authorities.

“At Chennai’s Loyola College, VCK, Communists, Naxalites and Christians, who are trying to change people’s religion, and other evil forces have come together and are conspiring against Hindu religion and they are launching an attack against the nation. A complaint has been filed with the police regarding this. The PM and Hindu religion have been portrayed in a derogatory manner. And action must be taken against this,” he said in a Twitter post.

Soon, BJP state president Tamilisai Soundarrajan and Union minister Pon Radhakrishnan too joined the chorus and urged the government to take action, though the exhibits were removed even before the grand finale on Sunday was over, according to an organiser of the event.

In its apology, the college said it was “deeply pained, saddened and equally anguished that the venue for the cultural event, the illustrious and pluralistic campus, has been misused for derogative exhibits against a particular religious group, social institution, political party and the country’s leadership”.

“We acknowledge our lapse and sincerely apologise for the insurmountable hurt this has caused,’ the statement added.

However, the opposition including the DMK, the CPI(M), and the VCK have criticised the right wing campaign against the exhibition and the targeting of the college as an attempt to stifle freedom of expression and the liberty of artistes.

This is not the first time that a Jesuit institution has come under attack from the BJP and its saffron affiliates. Earlier, Raja had opposed an international seminar on ‘Atrocities Against Women As Recorded in Tamil Literature’ scheduled to be held in December at the St Joseph’s College, Trichy, alleging the theme of the programme hurt Hindu sentiments and belittled the Tamil language.

In response, state Tamil development and culture minister, ‘MaFoi’ K Pandiarajan, had said that the Government would not allow such a slanderous seminar to be held.

Following this, the college had postponed the seminar without any dates, claiming that the students and staff were engaged in relief works in the nearby Delta districts, ravaged by the Gaja cyclone.

This too had invited criticism of saffron intervention in academic freedom and critical enquiry in higher educational institutions from the academic community.