The name of EV Ramasami (EVR) is little known outside of South India. He set out to improve the lot of Tamil Dalits. But the way he went about doing it was rather unusual, to say the least. To him, the social order of Hinduism was the source of all social ills. So, he worked tirelessly to shred Hinduism to pieces. As his movement gathered momentum, the political arm of his followers captured control of the state government machinery. This led to the almost total elimination of non-Dalits (mainly Brahmins) from the Govt jobs, from award of Govt contracts and from admission to universities. Here are some of his doings,
1. He saw Islam and Christianity as religions devoid of caste system and encouraged Dalit conversions into these religions – that did not however change their social standing as lower caste converts to Christianity continue to have separate churches and lower caste converts into Islam do not get socially, anywhere close to the well off ones.
2. In order to denigrate the Hindu deities, he would arrange for their processions through various towns with a garland of old/used shoes around their necks.
3. Few years back, when some Hindus attempted to celebrate Dussehara by burning an effigy of Ravan, his followers threatened to counter by burning an effigy of Lord Ram. So the whole idea was dropped.
4. He even embraced communism for its professed belief in equality of all men and for its lack of belief in God. So enamored were his followers with this concept, that one of them even named his son Stalin (the current mayor of Chennai).
5. The Ram Setu bridge which was used by Shri Ram and his army to cross over to Sri Lanka to fight Ravan, is sacred to Hindus. When the issue of deepening the ocean channel by removing this bridge came up, the Hindus opposed it as desecration of something sacred to them. But the Tamilnadu Govt. led by EVR’s supporters questioned the very basis of Bhagwan Ram having ever existed and favored the destruction of the bridge.
6. A whole generation of Tamils have grown up hearing the ruling politicians (EVR followers) denounce Hinduism as something evil and outdated, which does not merit any place in a man’s life.
Questions to HDF members in/from Tamilnadu: With the quota system for Dalits imposed in all walks of life, what is the current ground reality? Does the anger towards the Brahmins still continue? Does a Brahmin have to hide his religious identity in order to be considered for Govt jobs and admission to a university? Just curious how this godless society is working out.
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