Madras High Court: Atheists have the right to believe in non-existence of god

Madras High Court dismissed a petition that sought to remove inscription from a Periyar statue that says, “There is no god.” The petition was filed by a person named M Deivanayagam. He believes that the inscription under the Periyar statue is offensive to the believers and hurt their religious sentiments. He wanted the government to remove the inscriptions from the statue and accused Dravidar Kazhagam, the successor of Justice Party founded by Periyar of propagating false views which were not really Periyar’s.

The inscription under the Periyar statue is-

“There is no god, no god, there really is no god

He who created god is a fool

He who preaches god is a scoundrel

He who prays to god is uncivilised.”

Petitioner claimed that these were not the views of Periyar and he was a humanist and not an atheist. Dravidar Kazhagam rejected all the claims and said that all the inscriptions were made only at the instance of Thanthai Periyar. He also added that Thanthai Periyar knows the situation that if there is no inscriptions like this then people will worship the statue for years, something that Periyar would have never wanted.

A bench consisting of Justice S Manikumar and Subramonium Prasad rejected the PIL on Wednesday, September 4, and said that Dravidar has the right to believe in the non-existence of God just like the petitioner has the right to believe in god under the article 19 of the Indian Constitution.

The court further said that there is no doubt that Periyar was an atheist. There are numerous writings and speeches which prove that he denied the existence of god. The court order says, DK has the right to express his beliefs and views on religion and existence of God.