CHENNAI: Campaigning hours after filing his nomination at suburban Kolathur, the flood-hit constituency from where he won last election, Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (DMK) treasurer MK Stalin focussed his campaign on Wednesday on finding solutions to the civic woes there.
This was one of the only two days that he will be campaigning for himself, while the rest of it is spread across the State.
The campaign meetings at 10 different points in the constituency were not as well-attended as the party would have liked, but those who gathered there complimented the DMK leader for the work that he oversaw during the devastating Chennai floods last monsoon.
“Stalin was the only senior politician who came to meet us at the time of floods. We believe he would extend the same kind of support after he gets elected,” said I Kamal, a long-time resident of Bangaru Street, with an air of certainty about the outcome of the May 16 Assembly election.
Addressing the gathering at the junction nearby, Stalin said he wanted to spend the entire Rs 10 crore MLA constituency development fund for Kolathur. “But there was no support from the government, which instead obstructed it,” he said.
Kolathur was like his ‘motherland’, Stalin repeated what he said earlier in the day, hoping rather candidly that his victory this time would be with a higher margin – he won narrowly last Assembly polls with less than 3,000 votes.
Taking up issues specific to his constituency, the former Chennai mayor promised the local public here that if voted to power, he would take initiatives including renovating Gouthamapuram Housing Board flats, closed drainage and effective solid waste management at Balaji Nagar, Kumaran Nagar and Vengadeshwara Nagar, and also laying new drinking water lines and setting up rations shops at Cholinganagar and other adjacent areas.
The cadre who attended the rally were young like L Praveen from Jamaliya who noted that they were ready to accept him as the next chief minister.
“He is not a novice; he has been into active politics since the Emergency. We have the hope that he can give a better rule and his recent ‘Namakku Naame’ campaign was an example for it,” he said.