Alleging he made incendiary statements in public, the Hyderabad Police Commissioner externed Swami Paripoornananda of Sri Peetham for six months. The move comes on the heels of a similar order passed against film critic Kathi Mahesh.
The police cited numerous instances of public speeches made by the Swami, alleging that they amounted to provocative acts . He was placed under house arrest in Jubilee Hills on Monday after he announced his proposal to take up a three-day yatra from Boduppal to Yadadri.
The externment order issued on Tuesday was made under section 3 of Telangana Prevention of Anti-Social and Hazardous Activities Act. The pontiff reportedly demanded the arrest of film critic Kathi Mahesh, who was also externed from the city.
The Vishwa Hindu Parishad (VHP) condemned the police move while lauded the action taken against Mr. Mahesh.
“It’s not fair that the police treat equally someone who has hurt religious sentiments with someone who seeks to protest against hurtful comments about religion,” said M. Ramaraju VHP President for Telangana.
BJP objects
Meanwhile, the entire Telangana BJP leadership strongly took objection to the Government banishing Sri Paripoornanda Swamy from Telangana and termed it as “unjust, undemocratic and unconstitutional”. Strongly condemning the police action against the seer, party chief K. Laxman called it as an official conspiracy and demanded that cases filed against him be withdrawn immediately.
The BJP leader also called upon the Government to take severe action against those hurting the Hindu religious sentiments and wondered why it did not take such drastic steps against Majlis leaders when they had made derogatory remarks against the Hindu gods and goddesses.
Later, a team of senior leaders led by former Union Minister Bandaru Dattatreya, Assembly floor leader G. Kishan Reddy and others met Governor E.S.L. Narasimhan seeking his help to order a comprehensive enquiry into the entire episode.
It is an attack against the entire majority community, Mr.Dattatreya said.
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