JOIN USTamil Nadu CM M K Stalin asks parties to get ready to 'teach a lesson' to BJP
Terming the April 2021 elections to the Tamil Nadu Assembly as one that taught lessons to “fascist BJP” and “slave AIADMK”, DMK president and Chief Minister M K Stalin has stressed the need to replicate the success achieved in the state by the alliance at the national level.
At an event to unveil the portrait of late CPI veteran D Pandian here on Monday evening, Stalin said everyone should take a pledge to “teach a lesson” to those who should be “taught” nationally while heaping praise on the “ideological friendship” between the DMK and the Left parties.
Stalin’s assertions against the BJP came days after he endorsed a suggestion put forward by ally Viduthalai Chiruthaigal Katchi (VCK) chief Thol. Thirumavalavan that the DMK president should not endorse an anti-BJP front sans Congress and instead bring all Opposition parties under one roof before the 2024 elections.
Hailing Pandian as a leader “who always held his head high”, Stalin recalled the late CPI leader’s last public speech in Madurai days before his death during which he issued a clarion call to the people of Tamil Nadu to defeat the AIADMK-BJP alliance.
“In the same meeting, I had termed the Assembly elections as one that would teach a lesson to fascist BJP and salve AIADMK. The people of Tamil Nadu have taught the right lesson. Everyone present here should take a vow to teach the right lesson to those who need it at the national level (read BJP),” Stalin said in his speech.
Stalin’s renewed attack against the BJP also comes days after the DMK endorsed Congress MP Rahul Gandhi’s distinction between “Hindu” and “Hindutva”. DMK has also given hints that Congress should lead the Opposition front to defeat the BJP.
DMK and Congress have been in an alliance since 2004, except for three years from March 2013 to February 2016. Stalin has taken a strident anti-BJP stance since he took over as DMK president in 2018 after his father M Karunanidhi’s death.
Pandian, who was grievously injured in the blast that killed former Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi in 1991, is a veteran CPI leader known for his fiery oratory skills, impeccable command over Tamil, and a strong subscriber of the Communist principles till his last breath.
Pandian was seriously injured in the blast that killed Rajiv Gandhi in Sriperumbudur on May 21, 1991, as he accompanied the former Prime Minister to translate his speech from English into Tamil. Pandian, who was then with the UCPI and won the subsequent election from North Chennai, was a witness in the sensational case.
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