Teaching true history a must to end trolls, says Tamil Nadu CM M K Stalin

CHENNAI: Chief minister M K Stalin on Saturday made a veiled attack at BJP cadres, saying there are people who believe in every message forwarded on WhatsApp without verifying them.

The finals of the centenary Kalaignar quiz competition were held in Chennai, in which Stalin participated and gave prizes to the winners.

Speaking at the function, Stalin said, "This is the age of WhatsApp! On WhatsApp, there is a bunch of people who believe that messages forwarded by someone are true without analysing them. If we want to put an end to it, we have to bring true histories to the people. Not everyone can read all the books. We need to teach them by preparing history in smaller modules. Competitions like this are the best way to do that."

Stalin was pointing out the criticism that the BJP cadres and supporters believe in forwarded messages without verifying them and are often trolled as 'WhatsApp University'.

Recently, even the TN BJP asked its cadres and supporters to read newspapers and watch TV for news instead of blindly trusting WhatsApp messages.

Stalin also compared the quiz competition with the recently conducted speech competition by the party's youth wing, headed by deputy CM Udhayanidhi Stalin, in which 182 youth participated in the finals. "Those 182 people are now shining as excellent speakers on DMK stages, and now you (quiz competition winners) have been created as a Dravidian repository," Stalin said.

The Kalaignar 100 quiz competition commenced in Sept last year and concluded on Saturday, in which more than two lakh people participated.

The event was conducted by the DMK women's wing, headed by MP Kanimozhi Karunanidhi. Stalin heaped praise on Kanimozhi for successfully conducting the event and asked her to continue the good work.