Union Home Minister Amit Shah on Friday slammed the Congress and its allies, including the DMK, saying nothing would happen by changing the name of their alliance to INDIA.
The senior BJP leader was addressing a rally here, ahead of kick-starting Tamil Nadu BJP President K Annamalai’s state-wide ‘En Mann, En Makkal (My Land, My People)’ padayatra.
In 10 years of the UPA government, Rs 12 lakh crore corruption took place, and changing the name of the alliance now will make no difference, Shah said.
“When Congress and its allies, including the DMK, go to the people seeking votes, the public would remember the corruption,” he said.
He said people will remember the UPA regime for the 2G Spectrum scam, CommonWealth games scam and Coal allocation scam. He also mentioned the “chopper scandal” apart from “Submarine scam and ISRO scam.” “Congress-DMK and allies opposed the removal of Art 370; is Kashmir ours or not,” he asked. “Don’t we need to free the nation from terrorism? When Modi undertook surgical and airstrikes, the UPA people opposed it.” Taking forward Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s Tamil pitch, he said Modi honoured Tamil culture by installing the ‘sengol’ in the new parliament building. Modi presented the Tamil language, culture, and thoughts of Tamil leaders to the world through various platforms. He is the first to “speak the Tamil language in the United Nations.” During the Congress-DMK rule, the massacre of Tamils occurred in Sri Lanka, and Tamil fishermen suffered, he said.
Through the yatra, Annamalai will establish Modi’s nationalism in place of regionalism, Shah added.
The ‘Entire World is One’ motto was borrowed from Tamil Nadu’s culture as India’s G20 motto, the union minister said, and recalled that during his trip to France, the PM announced the building of a statue of the saint-poet Tiruvalluvar.
He also underlined the welfare initiatives for Sri Lankan Tamils, besides highlighting the union government’s initiatives such as Kashi Tamil Sangamam and Tamil Saurashtra Sangamam.
Shah hit out at the DMK regime, calling it the most corrupt in the nation and said the BJP yatra is an attempt to usher in politics of development and good governance in Tamil Nadu. “This yatra is a journey to take Tamil culture from Kashmir to Kanyakumari and from Kolkata to Somnath.” Accusing the DMK regime of being a “government of illegal wine mafia, sand mafia and Tamil Nadu electricity generation and distribution scam,” Shah said, “This is an anti-poor government.” He named the Congress and its allies one by one, including the DMK, Trinamool Congress and Shiv Sena (UBT), and accused them all of trying to empower their families. They are not interested in the nation’s development, he alleged.
“Sonia Gandhi wants to make her son Rahul the Prime Minister, M K Stalin wants to make his son Udhayanidhi the Chief Minister.” The BJP top leader also criticised West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee, RJD leader Lalu Prasad Yadav and Shiv Sena (UBT) leader Uddhav Thackeray as leaders who desired to see their heirs in leadership positions.
“However, Modi is the only leader who is working for the nation’s development,” he said. In his nine years of leadership, Modi has replaced casteism, family politics, appeasement, and regionalism with the politics of performance, the top BJP leader said.
Shah also raised the issue of an accused DMK leader who is in jail continuing as a minister in Tamil Nadu. “Stalin should be ashamed of retaining V Senthil Balaji, arrested in an Enforcement Directorate case and in jail, in the cabinet,” the union minister said.
“Can a person in jail continue as a minister,” he asked. “Should Senthil Balaji not have resigned? Even if Senthil Balaji resigns, Stalin will not accept it because he is afraid that all secrets will be disclosed.” Stalin made more than 500 promises during the 2021 assembly election, but instead of fulfilling assurances, he drowned entire Tamil Nadu in the business of alcohol, Shah charged.
The senior BJP leader later flagged off the ‘En Mann, En Makkal’ padayatra by Annamalai, saying, “It is a yatra to free Tamil Nadu of dynastic and corrupt politics and start an era of development and pro-poor initiatives.” The union minister held Annamalai’s hand and raised it amid enthusiastic chants by party members.
Annamalai will travel on a vehicle for 10,000 km and on foot for 700 kilometres.
The stage put up for the launch of the padayatra was modelled on the newly inaugurated Parliament building.
The yatra, which will go on for six months, marks the start of BJP’s poll campaign ahead of the 2024 Lok Sabha election. The yatra will cover all 234 assembly constituencies in the state.
In his address, Annamalai likened the yatra to a ‘yagna’ to reach out to the people about the welfare schemes of the BJP-led Centre under PM Modi’s leadership and the “never-seen-before” financial allocations by the Centre to Tamil Nadu.
Annamalai praised the leadership of Prime Minister Modi and asserted that this is the rule of “common men” and Modi is an “ordinary man who made all Indians proud through his work”.
“Modi is a Tamilian at heart, and he has made Tamilians proud world over and taken Tamil culture and Tamil classic Tirukkural across the world, which echoed in the United Nations as well,” Annamalai said.
AIADMK General Secretary Edappadi K Palaniswami, who is also the Leader of the Opposition in Tamil Nadu, did not take part in the padayatra launch event though he was invited by the BJP.
Former Minister and senior AIADMK leader R B Udhayakumar represented his party and described Amit Shah as the “Iron Man of India” and hailed Annamalai as “Karumbu Manithar” (sweet man like sugarcane).
“I have come here to convey the greetings of the Iron Man of Tamil Nadu Edappadi K Palaniswami,” Udhayakumar said.
The AIADMK leader said both PM Modi and Amit Shah had great respect for late party matriarch J Jayalalithaa.
Annamalai’s predecessor in the party L Murugan, now union minister, during his stint as BJP state chief had undertaken the ‘Vel Yatra,’ (Vel refers to the spear, the weapon of Lord Muruga) ahead of the 2021 Assembly election. Four BJP leaders won in the Assembly polls and entered the Assembly after a gap of about 20 years at the time.
While the BJP’s Vel yatra commenced in 2020 from Tiruttani, a well known northern Tamil Nadu temple town, the present yatra is from Rameswaram and its traditional connect to Kashi has been praised (Kashi Tamil Sangamam) by Prime Minister Modi.
Annamalai’s yatra follows the release of two ‘files’ on the ruling DMK, alleging corruption, which was dismissed as false and defamatory by leaders of the Dravidian party.
Leaders of the BJP’s other alliance parties including G K Vasan (Tamil Maanila Congress-Moopanar) and K Krishnasamy (Puthiya Tamilagam) took part in the rally. BJP’s P Sudhakar Reddy and CT Ravi were also present.
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