PMK backs move, bats for culture protection

CHENNAI: Opposition PMK on Tuesday surprisingly rallied behind Chief Minister MK Stalin on the constitution of the high-level committee to protect state rights and improve Centre-state relations, even as allies of the ruling party supported the effort.

Thanking the CM for announcing the committee, VCK legislature party leader Sinthanaiselvan urged the Chief Minister to also include the election process as an area to be examined by the committee. The VCK MLA also said that the incumbent rulers in Delhi were wrongly interpreting the Constitution and steering the country on the wrong path.

PMK legislature party leader GK Mani said that destruction of one’s language was the way to destroy one’s culture. Mani also added that electoral alliances might change, but the rights of the state must be protected. Congress legislature party leader K Selvaperunthagai insisted on releasing a handbook of the speech made by M Karunanidhi in 1974 on state autonomy and circulated the same among the members.

Seeking to create history as an MLA who spoke on the 1974 resolution on State autonomy and 2025 in the same House, Leader of the House Duraimurugan said, “In future, if Udhayanidhi Stalin leads, I will speak on that resolution too.” Drawing a parallel between the political situation then and now, Duraimurugan recalled Pandit Nehru’s assurance to Tamil Nadu on the two-language policy and said, “If people who respected the Constitution a bit, did not do it then, will those who don’t bother about the Constitution do it now.”

DMK minister Palanivel Thiaga Rajan also picked holes in BJP MLA Nainar Nagendran’s argument and criticised that the devolution of GST share to TN after cess and surcharge deduction.