The DMK on Tuesday clarified that party chief MK Stalin’s remarks predicting the TVK government in Tamil Nadu may not survive beyond three months were not intended to suggest any attempt to bring down the dispensation.
Senior DMK leader and former minister Thangam Thennarasu said Stalin’s comments were made in the context of the prevailing law-and-order situation in the state and not with any “intent to dissolve or topple the government.”
Stalin, speaking on Sunday, had criticised the functioning of the ruling TVK administration led by C Joseph Vijay.
“I need not say much about the kind of government currently in power. When it assumed office, I had said I would not criticise it for six months. However, there is now a fear that circumstances may force me to speak sooner,” the former chief minister had said.
Responding to criticism over Stalin’s remarks, Thennarasu said the DMK leader only highlighted the fragile condition in which the government was functioning.
“Stalin had stated that we would not criticise the current government for six months and he remarked that the government was proceeding in such a precarious condition that it might not even last three months."
“When reporters asked leaders of various political parties about this, they said that the DMK leader should not have spoken that way. In reality, our leader never said the government would collapse, nor is that his stance”, the DMK leader said in a party statement.
“This is precisely what the leader (Stalin) highlighted in his speech and not out of any intent to dissolve or topple the government”, he said.
Stalin “essentially meant that the government is operating under a cloud of uncertainty regarding whether it will even survive for three months."
“But watching daily reports of murders, robberies, machete attacks, drug trafficking, power cuts, farmers' protests and sexual violence, how could they remain silent.
It was in that context he (Stalin) said one wonders whether the government can even last three months,” Thennarasu claimed.
Thennarasu further alleged that the month-old TVK government had been overshadowed by reports of murders, robberies, sexual assaults, drug trafficking and other law-and-order concerns.
“Functionaries of the ruling party itself are implicated in various criminal incidents,” he claimed.
(With inputs from PTI)