Tamil Nadu Congress President Su Thirunavukkarasar, on Wednesday, criticised Prime Minister Modi and said that there are no takers for his alliance invitation.
With the Lok Sabha polls fast approaching, national and regional parties are scrambling to seal political alliances in states. Tamil Nadu, with its 39 seats, is the fifth largest state in terms of number of Lok Sabha seats. This makes it an important state to win to claim the prime ministerial chair. While the opposition party of Tamil Nadu, the DMK, has joined hands with the Congress-led UPA, the ruling party AIADMK has not yet announced its decision.
Thirunavukkarasar took a jibe at the prime minister saying that parties in the BJP-led National Democratic Alliance (NDA) have been walking out and in contrast to it, the Congress-led United Progressive Alliance (UPA) is getting stronger, according to reports. “PM Modi may keep the door open. But no party is prepared to go inside… be it in Tamil Nadu or in the rest of the country, there is no single party which has accepted his invite and joined hands with the BJP,” he said.
Thirunavukkarasar was referring to Prime Minister Modi’s speech in Tamil Nadu while interacting with booth-level workers. Modi had said that BJP was open to alliances and cherished its old friends. This statement was considered a hint at both the DMK and the AIADMK which had allied with the BJP in the past. PM Modi also mentioned former Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee many times in his speech and stated BJP has followed Vajpayee’s way.
This prompted DMK’s Stalin to hit back stating that PM Modi was no Vajpayee and accused him of ignoring Tamil Nadu’s interests. “Modi is not someone who is in the prime minister’s chair to preserve the multi-cultural identities of India. The people of Tamil Nadu will never forget that Tamil Nadu’s rights were denied in Narendra Modi’s tenure like never before,” Stalin had retorted.
Source: The News Minute