DMK president M.K.Stalin on Monday claimed that Chief Minister Edappadi K. Palaniswami, who is also AIADMK co-coordinator, would face trouble from January 27. He was referring to the scheduled release of former Chief Minister Jayalalithaa’s aide and ex-AIADMK interim general secretary V K Sasikala from the Bengaluru prison.
Addressing a Makkal Gram Sabha meeting conducted by the DMK at Kurumbapatti in Edappadi, Salem district, Mr. Stalin alleged that Mr. Palaniswami had betrayed Sasikala, “who made him Chief Minister” and he claims that she had no role in his appointment.
The DMK leader said that the Chief Minister would face trouble even before Assembly elections as Sasikala would be released on January 27.
Listening to public grievances on the need for various basic amenities in the area, Mr. Stalin said that these are responsibilities of Local Administration Minister S.P. Velumani but he was “Minister for ‘Department of Corruption’.”
Mr. Stalin charged that while the Chief Minister claimed that he has attracted several lakh-crore of rupees as investment into the State and would provide jobs to lakhs of youth, there were over 9,000 educated unemployed youth in Mr. Palaniswami’s Edappadi constituency alone.
At a Makkal Gram Sabha meeting in Dharmapuri, he alleged that the AIADMK failed to control inflation. He said that prices of essential commodities like domestic gas, rice, cereals and others have gone up.
He charged that Higher Education Minister K.P. Anbalagan, who hails from Dharmapuri, failed to protect Anna University and tried to hand it over to Centre. Those efforts were dropped only after the DMK protested.
According to him, the Hogenakkal combined water supply scheme, which was implemented during the erstwhile DMK regime, was put in back-burner by AIADMK government. He added that though questions were raised in this regard during Assembly sessions but no proper reply was received.
Mr. Stalin assured that more areas would be included in the combined water supply scheme in Krishnagiri and Dharmapuri districts within five months of the DMK being elected to power [if it wins the Assembly polls].
He charged that Mr. Anbalagan during election campaign promised that steps would be taken to bring water from Then Pennai River at Alayalam to Thulchetti lake here but no measures were taken. The Chief Minister too had reiterated it during the MGR centenary celebrations but no measures were taken to implement the project.
Mr. Stalin assured that remedial measures would be taken immediately after the DMK Government came to power.
