VSK TN
Cartoonist Verma was arrested in wee hours of Chennai for his cartoon depicting Thol Thirumavalavan , Chidambaram MP, bootlicking DMK’s shoes.The cartoon uploaded in his Facebook invited dirty comments and feedback from both VCK and DMK cadres. This cartoon comes after Thirumavalavan’s reaction to DMK’s MP Dhayanidhi Maran’s stale comment about the scheduled communities. Dhayanidhi uttered these comments while talking to press after meeting the Cheif Secretary of TN .Shanmugham regarding action on pending issues pertaining to different constituencies. Maran complained that the CS did not give him due respect and exclaimed,”are we to be treated like Scheduled Castes?” While everybody expected that the self-proclaimed leader of Dalits in the state,Thirumavalavan will condemn strongly against Maran’s comment, he only gave a mild retort stating such statement is mere a slip of tongue by a friend. It is an open secret that DMK played a major role in winning the constituencies for VCK party. So,Thirmavalavan chose to downplay his reaction. All the same, the cat was out of the bag.Verma’s cartoon depicted the entire episode vividly.
Well, pictures are powerful than words, Verma’s cartoon struck the right chord. Threats and call for arrest all started pouring in. Eventually, the TN Police budged to political pressure and arrested the cartoonist on May 18 .
Irony laughed when the call to arrest came from M H Jawahirullah, of MMK party, who himself is out on bail for more than 2 years. While the law didn’t take its due course against the real perpetrator Maran for his awful comments nor earlier DMK’s RS Bharathi for his disgusting remarks on media persons, it is quick to arrest Cartoonists for exercising the freedom of expression in social media. Itmay be recalled how cartoonist Mathi faced similar reactions under DMK’s political pressure. he was sacked from the media house he was working for. Freedom of Expression in Tamilnadu is sought to be grabbed by Dravidian groups. Is it not high time that Press Council teaches a lesson or two to the bullies?