H Raja regrets Periyar tweet, blames social media admin

Under fire for his controversial comments on Dravidian leader 'Periyar', BJP national secretary H Raja on Wednesday put the blame on his Facebook administrator for the episode while expressing regrets over it.

"I regret. The post was put on my Facebook by the administrator without my knowledge. Once I came to know about it, I removed the post and removed the administrator too," Raja told reporters here, soon after BJP chief Amit Shah publicly warned cadre against statue vandalisations.

Following his comment that statues of EV Ramaswamy 'Periyar', an iconic figure in Tamil Nadu, could be the next to be pulled down after a Lenin statue was vandalised in Tripura, a statue of Periyar was descrated in Vellore district of Tamil Nadu.

The BJP's state unit had distanced itself from the issue, saying it was his personal view.

Two people were arrested at Tirupattur in Vellore district for the statue vandalisation.

"I did not intend to hurt anyone's sentiments. This was done without my consent. I was flying to Delhi when it was posted," Raja said.

In a Facebook post earlier in the day, he said, "Views should be confronted by views only and not by violence. I have no intentions of hurting anybody. Therefore, if anybody felt hurt by that post, I express my heartfelt regret. It is not acceptable to us to damage any statue of Periyar."

The controversial post, which is now deleted, read, "Who is Lenin? What is the relevance he holds in India? What is the link between communism and India? Lenin's statues were destroyed in Tripura, tomorrow, in Tamil Nadu, casteist Periyar's statues will be destroyed."

The minister is not new to controversy. Last year, after the Tamil film 'Mersal' was released he had made remarks about the movie's actor Vijay.

"Vijay is a practicing Christian. He should have said build hospitals before churches, instead he says build hospitals before temples. It is like provoking Hindus," Raja had tweeted.

Recently, he also took on Kamal Hasan and described him a "spineless coward" when the latter announced his decision to enter politics.