India: We Artists, Academics and Citizens Condemn the Attack on Sundarayya Vignana Kendram

SAHMAT
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Date-11-03-08

PRESS STATEMENT

We the following academics, artists and concerned citizens strongly condemn the attack on the night of 10th March 2008 by miscreants led by R.S.S and B.J.P on Sundarayya Vignana Kendram in Hyderabad. These miscreants tried to burn the portrait of Putchalapalli Sundarayya and the thousands of books housed in the Kendram. They also attacked the staff that resisted the burning of the Kendram.

The Sundarayya Vignana Kendram, a renowned library, cultural and research centre has been striving for the last two decades in preserving the composite cultural heritage of the Indian civilization. It has the largest and rare collections of Telugu, English and Urdu books as also journals and manuscripts. It’s involvement in community service is enormous. It’s service to the global community of scholars in facilitating research into Indian history, culture and heritage is well acknowledged.

The attack on such a renowned cultural centre is totally unacceptable. It is against all norms of civil society. We are concerned with the increasing acts of cultural policing and fascist attacks and call upon the civil society to reject the politics of intolerance, hate and vandalism.

Teesta Setalvad
– Javed Anand
– Ruchira Gupta
– Anurag Chaturvedi
– Madan gopal Singh
– Amar Farooqui
– Arjun Dev
– Archana Prasad
– Mihir Bhattacharya
– N.K.Sharma
– Prabhat Patnaik
– Utsa Patnaik
– Jayati Gosh
– Badri Raina
– D N Jha
– C P Chandrasekhar
– Prabir Purkayasta
– Chanchal Chohan
– Aditya Mukherjee
– Madhu Prasad
– Indira Chandrasekhar
– M.M.P. Singh
– Irfan Habib
– Shireen Moosvi
– Amit Sengupta
– Dinesh Abrol
– M K Raina
– Vikas Rawal
– Ram Rahman
– Sesha Reddy
– Javeed Alam
– Manjari Katju
– Atlury Murali
– Shasheej Hegde
– D.Narasimha Reddy
– Gali Arunkumar
– G. Sudarshan Reddy
– Purendra Prasad
– K. Chakradhara Rao
– Pillalamarri Ramulu
– K. Balagopal
– G. Haragopal
– Kodandarami Reddy
– L. Pratap Reddy
– Aribandi Prasad Rao
– K. Chinnaya Suri
– N. Venugopal Rao
– K.N. Panikkar
– Malini Bhattacharya
– Parthiv Shah
– Sohail Hashmi