Chennai, Sep 10 — Tamil Nadu Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) President Nainar Nagenthran on Thursday questioned the 'Secular Social Justice Victory Alliance' name adopted by the Tamilaga Vettri Kazhagam (TVK)-led coalition in the state, while accusing the C. Joseph Vijay-led party of "promoting Tamil and Christianity".
The decision was taken at the second round of consultations among the alliance partners, held at the TVK headquarters in Panaiyur near Chennai on Wednesday.
Speaking to reporters in Chennai, Nagenthran said: "It's not social secularism. Tamil Nadu Finance Minister Marie Wilson and Assembly Speaker JCD Prabhakar are only talking about Christianity and Tamil, which is not good."
"They (TVK) are saying things like 'Christianity is very good'. How is that social justice secularism? It's not correct," he asserted.
The Tamil Nadu BJP chief made the remarks in reference to the alleged controversial statement of state Finance Minister N. Marie Wilson that had recently triggered a political row.
Wilson had reportedly asserted that studying Tamil could not teach what Christianity had taught him, while responding to criticism over his Tamil language skills during his Budget speech in the State Assembly.
Previously, the BJP had accused Tamil Nadu Assembly Speaker JCD Prabhakar of attempting to promote Christianity.
A controversy erupted after Prabhakar attended the 5th National March for Life, an anti-abortion rally, as a chief guest on August 8 and 9 in Chennai.
Calling out the TVK leader, BJP leader Narayanan Thirupathy had then said: "We have seen that JCD Prabhakar has been supportive of Christianity from the very beginning and has been trying to promote the Christian religion. There is no problem with him having faith in his religion, but in a democracy, he should not use his position to emphasise or promote his own religion."
TVK had emerged as the single largest party in the Tamil Nadu Assembly election after winning 108 seats.
Although it fell short of the majority required to form the government on its own, the TVK secured the backing of several constituents of the former DMK-led alliance, including the Congress, Viduthalai Chiruthaigal Katchi (VCK), Indian Union Muslim League (IUML) and the two Communist parties (Communist Party of India and the Communist Party of India-Marxist).
Meanwhile, Nainar Nagendran said that the BJP will lend support to the AIADMK candidates in the upcoming Assembly bypolls of Madurantakam and Dharapuram constituencies in Tamil Nadu.