Chennai: Their thalaivar Kalaignar might have proclaimed atheism multiple times and even publicly chastised senior party functionaries and cabinet colleagues for smearing kumkum and holy ash on the forehead; but thousands of DMK members across Tamil Nadu are now engaged in intense praying seeking divine blessings for M. Karunanidhi’s quick recovery and return home from his ICU bed in Kauvery Hospital.
“We know Kalaignar does not believe in God; still, we knew that he needed our Amman’s grace to come out of his present crisis. That’s why we had conducted a joint prayer with lighted lamps before the Erikkarai Mariamman Temple at Nungambakkam”, said Sema. Narayanan, president, TN potters’ association.
He said the potters were grateful to Karunanidhi as he had constituted a welfare board for them during his tenure as the Chief Minister. “He had done good for us just as he had for many other weaker sections. He always had deep concern for the poor and downtrodden”, Narayanan said.
“Kalaignar would look at the deity every time his car passed the temple on his way to the Murasoli office from his Gopalapuram residence or the DMK headquarters at Anna Arivalayam”, said Narayanan.
Only ‘look’ and not say a silent prayer? With a knowing smile, the potter chief said, “Well, we all know he is a non-believer, a staunch atheist, follower of Periyar”.
Not just that; Karunanidhi had pulled up a senior DMK MP during one of his terms in office for coming to work sporting a thick spread of kumkum on his forehead. “Why are you bleeding on the forehead?” he asked the rattled MP Adhi Sankar.
On another occasion in his CM term, the DMK chief said the fire-walking ritual in temples was a ‘barbaric act’. He was reacting to one of his ministers performing the ritual.
Yet it should go to the Dravidian patriarch’s credit that people cutting across all faiths lent their diehard loyalty to them, and held prayers in their various places of worship. Potter Sema.
Narayanan was just one of them.
