Not among equals
Councillors of Tirunelveli Corporation were recently locked in an unusual gender-based debate. Sidestepping women councillors and their male counterparts were interrupting women when they were raising issues in their wards.
After having tolerated it for more than one-and-a-half hours, a woman ward councillor got up in a rage and urged the mayor to allow the women to speak. In no time other women councillors joined the chorus. Soon, the mayor asked a councillor who was interrupting the woman to sit down.
“Women are given 50 per cent reservation to contest in local bodies. Now the State government may have to give them reservation to allow them to speak and raise their ward-level issues in male-dominant councils,” quipped a reporter.
A VIP forever
When a former union minister recently reached Tiruchy International Airport, officials let him access the VIP lounge against the usual practice and protocol. Maybe they obliged since he is a seasoned politician and an ex-diplomat. When one of his relatives came with breakfast for him, officials denied him access, citing security restrictions.
They also informed the VIP that outside food was not permitted inside the lounge. When the officials were informed that he is diabetic and prefers homemade food, he was told they could consider permitting him to have it at the airport manager’s office. The VIP refused since he did not want to be “at the mercy of a manager”, and instead ate outside the terminal.
In flavour, not in spirit
The State-run Tasmac, which sells liquor in Tamil Nadu, is yet to standardise the billing process at its vast network of outlets. The DMK government had promised to plug in loopholes to stop tax leakages and has completed more than a year in office, but no bills are given to customers even at Tasmac elite outlets.
The outlets prefer cash or UPI transactions for obvious reasons. When a customer asked for tequila recently, an outlet at tony Anna Nagar in Chennai readily took out an expensive bottle of ‘Don Azus’, manufactured by a company called Mexica Teqilero.
The big-banner brand name printed on the bottle has an explanatory note, of course in small font size, ‘Alcoholic spirit drink with flavour of TEQUILA’. What’s more, the Mexican-sounding brand name and company are non-existent as per Google.
Social media never forgets
EV Velu, Minister of Highways, recently faced backlash on social media over his remarks that CM MK Stalin never opposed the Chennai-Salem eight-lane highway project. When the erstwhile AIADMK government took steps to implement the project in a hurried manner without paying heed to the opposition of landowners, mostly farmers, DMK opposed the project tooth and nail.
Social media trolls summarily dug out old statements issued by Stalin to remind the minister of the party’s earlier stance against the project, leaving the party top brass red-faced.
(Contributed by Jose K Joseph, Thinakaran Rajamani, S Kumaresan. Compiled by Affan Abdul Kadar)