An air of eeriness and uncertainty enveloped the DMK headquarters Anna Arivalayam as the two-month-long “self-introspection meeting” of the party began on Thursday.

Appealing to bickering cadre to stay united, party headquarters secretary Duraimurugan set the tone for the “tell all” meeting by asking functionaries to be outspoken. 

As soon as he wound up his opening speech and exited the hall with party general secretary K Anbazhagan, organising secretary RS Bharati and propaganda secretary A Raja, all but one chair was removed from the dais from which DMK working president MK Stalin, with a tone of regret, was understood to have expressed regret at not being able to lend ears to the disgruntled cadre thus far. 

Conceding that he was unable to meet them even when they had queued up outside his house to air their grievances in the past, Stalin calmed the uneasy functionaries from Coimbatore and The Nilgiris by pointing to the “resolution box” kept on the stage. 

He asked the participating functionaries, who were let in to the hall only after a thorough verification of “participant cards” by gatekeepers of his personal PR team, to drop written statements if they found the grievances too difficult to utter in public. Not convinced by his reassuring statement, Stalin was understood to have told them that the resolution box would be sealed in his presence and taken directly to his house. “I will personally read all the statements. No one will ever get to know what you write about the party affairs in your districts. 

Action (on your statements) will follow assured Stalin,” one of the skeptic functionaries, who took part in the meeting, told DT Next. However, the DMK working president was learnt to have asked functionaries not make personal criticism in open and put them in writing. 

Interaction with DMK insiders suggested that Stalin might secretly share a mobile number for disgruntled cadre to ‘brief’ the sorry state of affairs of the party to him personally or to his confidant.