AIADMK leader and Lok Sabha Deputy Speaker M. Thambi Durai on Saturday accused the BJP-led Centre of encroaching on the powers of State governments.
“You are taking away the powers from the State List to the Concurrent List. Even, residuary powers, you are taking away,” he said at the inauguration of the Institute of Dravidian Studies at the St. Peter's Institute of Higher Education and Research, Avadi.
However, Chief Minister Edappadi K. Palaniswami, who inaugurated the institute, and his deputy O. Panneerselvam, refrained from criticising the Central government on the occasion.
The Chief Minister offered an alternative vision of Dravidian unity. “The Dravidian States should take advantage of our common ethnicity to work together more,” he said.
Mr. Panneerselvam vowed to further Mr. Annadurai’s ideals. “I recall my participation in the anti-Hindi agitation. That movement was built on the principle of State autonomy,” he said.
Quoting Annadurai on his birth anniversary, Mr. Thambi Durai said, “Our CM and Deputy CM know what problems they are facing. I have to go and represent the Chief Minister’s and Finance Minister’s demands; we could not succeed at the Centre because they want a monopoly.” .
Hindi imposition
On Vice-President M. Venkaiah Naidu’s reported comments that Hindi was a symbol of the social and political unity, Mr. Thambi Durai said: “If you want to see if welfare programmes go to the people, it is possible only through language. Now, you cannot understand what scheme the Centre gives us. Sarva Shiksha Yojana, PM Sadak Yojana....I said in Parliament: at least you name it in Tamil, ‘Anaivarukkum Kalvi.’ That is the fanaticism, that kind of fanaticism we are opposing.”.