Madras High Court stays proceedings against lyricist

Justice M S Ramesh on observing that Vairamuthu had merely extracted a sentence from a research paper and there was no offence in his comments, said “Prima facie no case has been made out and that he was unable to comprehend and accept the case registered against him.”

Passing the interim order staying all criminal proceedings against him, the judge then posted the case to February 16 after directing the prosecution and the counsel appearing for the defacto complainant to file their counter.

Facing stiff attack from various groups despite seeking an apology for his essay, Vairamuthu had approached the Madras High Court seeking to quash the FIR registered against him at the Kolathur police station. The complaint was lodged by Muruganathan, an office-bearer of the Tamil Nadu wing of Vishwa Hindu Parishad.

Vairamuthu in his plea had contended that the impugned FIR is false, without any prima facie case or evidence to attract the ingredients of the offences alleged.

Noting that the defacto complainant has set the criminal law in motion solely based on the research article authored by him, said “If the research article is read by a common man it would evidently prove that there is no description of Andal as stated by the complainant.” Also, submitting that the Kolathur police has not even perused the research article published before registering the complaint, said “The research article is a part of continuous research wherein ‘Andal’ has been described as a poet having true love towards God. The philosophical principle as well as religious principle and the foreseeing thought of Andal 1,300 years before is also described as a divine contribution not only to the Tamil Literature but to women liberation and empowerment.” 

“But without understanding the true letter and spirit of the research articles, some miscreants to get cheap publicity have begun to write to the media as if he has wrongly projected ‘Andal’,” Vairamuthu added and noted that he quoted the excerpt of an author, but nowhere agreed or substituted his views as the view of the said author.

According to the complainant, the lyricist had made some remarks against Hindu goddess Andal, which could lead to communal disharmony and a law-and-order problem as they hurt the religious sentiments of the Hindus, especially the Vaishnavites.

Vairamuthu found himself in the thick of a controversy when the Tamil daily reproduced his speech at the Srivilliputhur Andal temple titled ‘Thamizhai Andal’.

The national award-winning poet in his speech had quoted a researcher, who in turn had said, “Andal herself is a Devadasi who lived and died in the Sri Rangam Temple.’