The Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam will soon decide on the percentage of seats to be allotted to youth and women for the Lok Sabha and other elections, party president M. Karunanidhi said on Saturday.
He made the revelation at the ‘Mupperum Vizha’ organised by the party here. In his opinion, 30 per cent of the party seats could be earmarked for the youth and five to 10 per cent for women.
Though the issue had not come up yet for formal discussions in the party forum he had done some loud thinking in this regard so that party general secretary K. Anbazhagan, who was present on the dais, would know his mind, he said. After due consultations with senior leaders such as Mr. Anbazhagan, the party would announce its policy on reservation of seats for these two categories of the party cadre, Mr. Karunanidhi said.
Mr. Karunanidhi said though he was now 88 years old and had won all the 12 elections he had contested so far, the latest being at Tiruvarur, where he romped home with a margin of 56,000 votes, it did not bring him cheer because the DMK had lost even the Opposition party status in the Assembly.
He would not blame party men for such a state of affairs, but attributed it to the mistakes committed by those for whom the DMK and its leaders toiled. Yet, he did not have any grief or anger over the turn of events because he was of the firm view that every failure was a stepping stone to success.
Mr. Anbazhagan said that he could think of only one reason for the drubbing which the party received in the elections, i.e., the party men’s failure to observe discipline. He called upon the cadre to safeguard the party discipline to get back to glory.
On the occasion, Mr. Karunanidhi gave away the Periyar Award to Mumbai Po. Appadurai; Anna Award to A.Rahman Khan; Pavendar Award to Subbulakshmi Jagadeesan and Kalaignar Award to R.D. Seethapathi.
