Defeat BJP’s communal politics in local body polls: Stalin tells DMK cadre

Amid BJP’s heightened campaign against the party-led government over the suicide of a 17-year-old student, DMK President and Chief Minister M K Stalin on Sunday asked his cadre to expose the BJP’s “degradation politics” that is aimed at “fomenting communal tension” before the public during the local body polls scheduled for February 19.

This is the first time that Stalin has spoken, albeit indirectly, on the issue of the minor’s girl suicide which the BJP alleges is due to “forced conversion” on the part of the hostel warden. Stalin’s statement came on the day the BJP led by its state unit chief K Annamalai visited the girl’s family in Ariyalur and handed over a cheque of Rs 10 lakh as ex-gratia.

The girl, who was a student at Sacred Heart Higher Secondary School in Tirukkaatupalli in Thanjavur district, consumed pesticides on January 9 and died 10 days later at a government medical college hospital. While the police said the girl died by suicide due to “ill-treatment” by her hostel warden, the BJP, armed with a video of the girl, has been alleging “forced conversion.”

“Expose the degradation politics of the BJP which aims to foment communal tension and violence in Tamil Nadu, the state known for peace and religious harmony. Tell people that the BJP and AIADMK have sealed an alliance to destroy Tamil Nadu and remind them that the state had always kept communal politics away from it,” Stalin told DMK cadres in a letter.

Hours later, he took to Twitter to ask people to take a pledge to deny any space for “heirs” of Nathuram Godse in India on the occasion of Mahatma Gandhi’s death anniversary.

Stalin’s letter to his cadres came as political parties in Tamil Nadu are gearing up to face the elections to urban local bodies on February 19. In the letter, Stalin asked DMK office-bearers in districts to “allot required” number of seats to alliance partners in corporations, municipalities, and town panchayats.

“Everyone should bear in mind that this is not just an electoral alliance. This alliance is based on ideology,” Stalin told his cadre. The DMK is holding talks with Congress, VCK, and other allies on seat-sharing for the local body elections.

The DMK president told his party men to follow “military discipline” in choosing the candidates for the election as these representatives will take the “good policies” of the government to the people.

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