CHENNAI: The Madras High Court on Thursday refused to restrain the state government from rolling out the ‘Nalam Kaakkum Stalin’ scheme — which provides comprehensive health checkups for the public — but emphasised that the Supreme Court guidelines on using leaders’ photos and names in government’s publicity content must strictly be adhered to. The state government has proposed to launch the scheme on August 2.
The plea for an interim injunction against the launch of the scheme was made by senior counsel Vijay Narayan, representing former AIADMK minister C Ve Shanmugam, before the first bench of Chief Justice Manindra Mohan Shrivastava and Justice Sunder Mohan, during the hearing of the petitions filed by the latter and an advocate, Iniyan, praying for orders to injunct the government from using the name ‘Stalin’ in the ‘Ungaludan Stalin’ scheme.
Shanmugam also sought the court to issue directions to the Election Commission of India (ECI) and the Committee on Content Regulation in Government Advertising to take necessary action against the DMK under Paragraph 16A of the Election Symbols (Reservation and Allotment) Order, 1968, and consequently forbear the Tamil Nadu Public Secretary from using the name ‘Stalin’ in relation to the activities of the scheme emanating from the GO dated June 19, 2025.
The bench said, “There will be a direction to the government that the SC’s guidelines on use of photographs and names shall strictly be followed.”
Vijay Narayan alleged that public funds are being misused for publicity of the scheme with the photos of the ideological leaders of DMK, former CM M Karunanidhi and the incumbent CM, along with the DMK symbol. He showed an advertisement in this regard and stated that using public funds in an election year for the benefit of a political party is “subversion of democracy”.
However, Advocate General P S Raman contended that the advertisement shown by Vijay Narayan was not at all issued by the Directorate of Information and Publicity, and noted the government’s advertisements will bear a DIPR code that is missing in this one.
Senior counsel P Wilson, appearing for the DMK, submitted that government schemes were launched in the name of PM Narendra Modi as ‘NaMo’ schemes, and in Andhra Pradesh, schemes were named after the then CM Jagan Mohan Reddy. He also noted several government schemes included the word ‘Amma’ referring to Jayalalithaa when the AIADMK was in power.
Directing the TN government and the ECI to file counter-affidavits within a week, and the petitioner to file a rejoinder three days thereafter, the bench said that subsequently the matters would be taken up for final hearing.