AIADMK will vote against FDI, says Jaya

Anticipating possible floor coordination in Parliament between Left parties and Mamata Banerjee’s Trinamool Congress in opposing the Centre’s policy to permit 51 per cent direct foreign investments (FDI) in multi-brand retail, the AIADMK is prepared to attack the UPA on this issue.

“We will definitely vote against FDI (policy),” AIADMK supremo and Tamil Nadu Chief Minister J Jayalalitha asserted in a brief media interaction here at the Secretariat after a near one-hour meeting with her party MPs (AIADMK has nine MPs in the Lok Sabha and five MPs
in the Rajya Sabha), to discuss their floor strategy.

Taking a few questions on the issue in the run-up to the winter session of Parliament beginning Thursday, Jayalalitha was quite clear that the AIADMK “will definitely vote” against the Congress-led UPA government if the Left parties moved a motion or resolution under Rule 184 which entailed voting against the Centre’s policy to allow majority FDI stake in multi-brand retail.

But as regards the planned no-confidence motion by Trinamool Congress leader Mamata Banerjee on the same issue, Jayalalitha preferred to wait and watch, even while reiterating that there was absolutely no change in the party’s stand rejecting the FDI policy in multi-brand retail.

She said: “I have issued a clear statement earlier that we oppose FDI in retail and I have categorically stated that I will not allow it in Tamil Nadu. There is no change in our stand.”