War of words continues between DMK, AIADMK over Rs 100 coin release function

The war of words, triggered by the release of the Rs 100 coin commemorating the centenary of M Karunanidhi by Union Defence Minister Rajnath Singh

The war of words between the DMK and AIADMK over the release of the Rs 100 coin commemorating the birth centenary of former Chief Minister M Karunanidhi continued on Tuesday with former Minister R B Udhayakumar taking objection to Chief Minister M K Stalin's remarks against his party general secretary Edappadi K Palaniswami and demanding their withdrawal.

The verbal feud started with Palaniswami suggesting an illicit relationship between the DMK and BJP. Stalin picked up the cudgels while speaking at a wedding on Monday, the day after the coin was formally released, and accused Palaniswami of rank ignorance, saying that the function attended by Defence Minister Rajnath Singh was organized by the Union Government.

Debunking the Chief Minister’s claim, Udhayakumar told the media in Madurai that the function was indeed organized by the State Government and showed the invitation for the event to prove his point.

Stalin's outburst against Palaniswami terming him as one lacking in sense was unfair and condemnable, he said adding that it was the Chief Minister who did not have the basic knowledge on who organized the event to launch the coin.

Wondering as to why the Chief Minister did not raise issues like the banning of NEET, inadequate allocation of funds and cutting down the funds of railway projects for the State with Rajnath Singh, the senior AIADMK leader said that Stalin’s anger over the denial of funds for the State would only get expressed through his boycott of the NITI Aayog meeting.

Urging Stalin to come clean on the nature of his party's association with the BJP, Udhayakumar said if they were in an alliance they should openly declare it.

The manner in which the Chief Minister rushed to the at-home event in Raj Bhavan also raised doubts about the DMK's links with the BJP as the party had been critical of Governor R N Ravi and had even declared a boycott of the Independence Day tea party before that.

If the DMK has now decided to be obsequious to the Union Government with a view to saving their own government in the State, they should inform the people about it and refrain from indulging in doublespeak by criticising the BJP in the open and bowing with servitude behind the screen, the former Minister said.

Since the coin release programme saw Rajnath Singh visiting the memorial of Karunanidhi along with BJP State President, K Annamalai, who had earlier vowed to demolish the DMK in the State, the AIADMK picked on it, too.

But Annamalai retorted by saying that there was nothing to be ashamed of being respectful to a five-time Chief Minister of the State and hit back at Palaniswami telling him that it was not like falling at the feet of others and standing before them with a bent spine for favours.

Thus, the AIADMK found ammunition to attack both the DMK and BJP by pointing at the bonhomie between the leaders of both parties at the coin release function.

Even Rajnath Singh was dragged into the controversy by the AIADMK as he praised Karunanidhi at the event after having described the DMK as a fount of corruption during the recent election

In other words, the rivalry between the DMK and AIADMK now is on proving who was more opposed to the BJP than the other.