DMK president M.K. Stalin on Tuesday said the country would be safe in the hands of a young Rahul Gandhi as Prime Minister.
Addressing a mammoth election meeting in support of the DMK Nilgiris (Reserved) Parliamentary constituency candidate A. Raja at Mettupalayam in Coimbatore, Mr Stalin urged the voters to leave the nation in the safe hands of Mr Gandhi. He hailed the Congress’ promise of rolling out the Minimum Income Support Programme (Nyuntam Aay Yojana) under which Rs 72,000 would be paid annually as minimum income to poor families in the country. The scheme was aimed at alleviating the sufferings of those living below poverty line.
The DMK leader criticised the AIADMK government in Tamil Nadu for what he called its “rank inefficiency”. He said the Pollachi sexual abuse and the rape-cum-murder of a child in Coimbatore had brought shame to the entire state. “Two women police personnel met me at the hotel (where he was staying) and said they hailed from Pollachi but felt ashamed to even say that (after the sexual abuse case),” he claimed.
Mr Stalin reiterated his allegations that the heist and murder at former Chief Minister Jayalalithaa’s Kodanad estate bungalow was carried out to destroy evidences against some powerful ruling party politicians. “Apart from over Rs 2,000 crore, Jayalalithaa had kept documents related to the properties of her ministers, their benamis, etc., at the Kodanad bungalow. There were also digital evidences of confessions made by them on the same... The dacoity was only to recover and destroy those evidences,” he alleged.
As an opposition leader, the DMK leader said he had the right to question the “mystery” surrounding Jayalalithaa’s death and reiterated that if voted to power, his government would order a probe into it.
He appealed to the electorate to vote for the candidates of the DMK and its allies just as they would do if his late father and former Chief Minister M Karunanidhi was the candidate in the constituency.