Alleging that the Parliament Secretariat had turned down the request of Union Minister M. K. Alagiri to speak in Tamil, All India Anna Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (AIADMK) chief J. Jayalalithaa on Monday said it is an insult to the language and asked the Dravida Munnettra Kazhagam to pull out of the United Progressive Alliance (UPA) government.
In a statement here, she said only MPs were entitled for services of a translator and not ministers.
“How can he function as a minister? How can he express his opinion in Parliament? Only members are being given services of interpreter as their speeches can be translated into English or Hindi. Why not the facility be extended to ministers? If the situation continued, ministers who do not know English or Hindi, can only remain toys,” she said.
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Ms. Jayalalithaa also questioned Chief Minister M. Karunanidhi’s silence on the matter.
“With such an insult to Tamil, it is better the DMK pulled out of the Union Ministry,” she said.
Besides Chemical and Fertilizers Minister Mr. Alagiri, DMK is represented in the Union Cabinet by Dayanidhi Maran, A Raja, Gandhiselvan and Napolean.
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