In response to the Sanatan controversy started by Tamil Nadu minister Udhayanidhi Stalin, actor and politician Kamal Haasan claimed on Friday that Udhayanidhi is being pursued simply because he mentioned Sanatan. According to Kamal Haasan, Periyar is the reason that everyone is familiar with the phrase “sanatan.” No other state, and certainly no political party, can lay claim to Periyar. “All of us got to know about the word ‘Sanatan’ because of Periyar. He once used to work in the temple. He was doing ‘puja’ in Varanasi with ’tilak’ on his forehead. Imagine how much anger he must have had to throw away all that and work in service of the people realising that it’s the biggest service. He lived his entire life like that. Neither the DMK nor any other party can claim Periyar as their own. Tamil Nadu can celebrate Periyar as its own,” Kamal Haasan said.
Kamal Haasan offered his view on the controversy earlier too and called Udhayanidhi’s statement comparing Sanatan with dengue, malaria his personal view on Sanatan. “If you disagree with his viewpoint, it is important to engage in a discussion based on the merits of Sanatana instead of resorting to threats of violence or legal intimidation tactics, or distorting his words to evoke emotional responses for narrow political gains,” Kamal Haasan tweeted during the peak of the controversy.
After PM Modi said that the INDIA bloc was attempting to destroy Sanatan in response to Udhayanidhi’s statement, the Sanatan row escalated into a major source of contention between the BJP and the Opposition. The Tamil Nadu chief minister MK Stalin asked his party members not to respond to this comment because it had divided the opposition.
Udhayanidhi, however, did not stop there and continued to make remarks about Sanatan. President Droupadi Murmu was invited since she is a widow and a tribal person, according to Udhayanidhi, after legislative activities were shifted to the new facility.
