Pune: In Pune, on the Senapati Bapat Road, the UTI bank exhibited paintings of the controversial, Hindu hater artist M.F. Hussain. Yesterday Hindu protagonists protested against this through phone calls and e-mails to the bank. Several Hindus joined hands with the Hindu Janajagruti Samiti to vehemently protest against this and finally compelled the bank to close down the exhibition.
Today morning before the bank began its transactions the bank officials rolled all the paintings belonging to Domnic Corda of `Contemporay Indian Art’ and kept them outside the bank. The bank manager, Shri. Sachin Belvalkar stated that they had no ulterior motive behind exhibiting these paintings. The bank holds free art exhibitions off and on, as a pastime for clients. However this time Mr. Domnic Corda had not appraised them about the exhibits. He also said that had they known these were M.F. Hussain’s blasphemous paintings then they would never have exhibited them. He tendered a written apology on behalf of the bank to the HJS for this untoward incident.
Domnic Corda booked and his house raided in search of more paintings
A case under section 292 (34)of the Indian Penal code has been registered against Mr. Domnic Corda for hurting the religious sentiments of Hindus by exhibiting paintings of M.F.Hussain denigrating Hindu deities, at the Chatushshrungi Police Station. Despite about 1200 cases being registered against M.F. Hussain for denigrating Hindu deities by painting them in the nude, Mr. Corda dared to exhibit the paintings hurting the Hindu religious sentiments because of which this stand had to be taken. The police raided his residence at Hadapsar in St. Patrick Town around 4 a.m. but the shrewd man ensured that Husain’s paintings exhibited at the UTI bank were not found there. However after a fervent search the Hindu protagonists managed to procure two paintings denigrating Lord Krushna in a locked room, which were then handed over to the police. When questioned about other pictures Corda gave false information that these were all the paintings that he possessed. On the first day of the exhibition about 15-20 paintings of Lord Ganapati were exhibited, out of which one had been used for advertisement in local dailies. Despite that Corda falsely denies owning any such paintings.
Those who protested against this exhibition and registered a complaint against this act of denigration were Shri. Milind Ekbote, Working President of the Dharmaveer Sambhaji Pratishthan and a former city councillor; Shri. Ashok Munde the sub-city President and Shri. Hemant Borkar, of the Bharatiya Janata Party; Mr. Rahul Gavade of the BJYM, Shri. Raj Yadav of the MNS, Shri. Sunil Jadhav of the Maratha Sangharsh Aghadi, Shri. Shambhu Gavare and Shri. Hemant Shinde of the Sanatan Sanstha, Shri. Sunil Ghanvat and Shri. Hemant Parsanis of the Hindu Janajagruti Samiti along with other Hindu protagonists.
Apology Letter By UTI
Related HJS campaign
>M.F. Hussain campaign