TIRUCHY: DESPITE three political alliances in the fray, the real contest in the upcoming Lok Sabha election is between the AIAMDK and the DMK, which the people of Tamil Nadu and the rest of the country only know too well, said AIADMK general secretary Edappadi K Palaniswami in Tiruchy on Sunday.
Launching his campaign for the general election here, where the candidates for all the 40 parliamentary constituencies in Tamil Nadu and Puducherry, besides the one contesting the Vilavancode by-election under the AIADMK-led alliance were introduced, Palaniswami further said they would always stand with the people from religious minorities. This is not said just for the sake of gaining votes, he added.
Alleging that the DMK has an NRI wing “just to smuggle drugs”, the AIADMK leader also questioned the former’s credibility in commenting about corruption when it received several hundred crores of rupees through electoral bonds.
Training his guns on Minister Udhayanidhi Stalin, Palaniswami advised him to change his “script” of campaigning with a “brick in hand” and enquiring about the construction of an AIIMS in Madurai as it had become “outdated.”
“While the DMK has 38 MPs in Parliament, none of the members took the brick to the House or staged a walkout asking for the medical institution’s immediate construction,” he added.
The former CM also hit out at MK Stalin for not publicly criticising the Congress-led government in Karnataka over their assertion of building a dam across River Cauvery in Mekedatu.
Speaking at the meeting, DMDK leader Premalatha Vijayakant reiterated that her party’s alliance with the AIADMK will extend to the 2026 Assembly elections as well as local body polls.
Making a veiled reference to the PMK, she said the DMDK would never jump ship in an alliance to get what it actually wanted.
PT leader K Krishnasamy, who was also present, said, “Why do we need [Narendra] Modi again even when his government is not doing anything for the people of Tamil Nadu. The DMK didn’t do any good either in the past three years.”