The Maharashtra Navnirman Vidhyarthi Sena, the student wing of Raj Thackeray's Maharashtra Navnirman Sena, on Wednesday condemned a United Kingdom newspaper which had reportedly referred to Ganesh festival as 'a festival of gays.'
In a letter sent to the British High Commissioner, its vice-president Sandeep Deshpande said "We want to bring to your notice that the British Newspaper Guardian had published wrong information about Lord Ganesha."
The letter said, "The newspaper had published that Ganesh festival is a festival of gays. It is wrong on the part of the newspaper to publish fake, malicious news".
It requested the British High Commissioner to take a serious note of the 'ugly, heinous act of maligning the image of Lord Ganesha' and ask the newspaper to publish an apology.
"In our civilization, Lord Ganesha is known as the God of wisdom. Any Indian, while starting a new job or taking up any assignment, worships Lord Ganesha," the letter further said.
The deity is worshipped not only in India but also in countries like Nepal, Indonesia, Malaysia, Java, Sumatra, Sri lanka etc, the letter added.