CHENNAI: “It is the beginning,” DMK’s chief M K Stalin declared while addressing a large gathering of party functionaries during a protest in Chennai on Saturday against Tamil Nadu governor Banwarilal Purohit for delaying his assent to the internal medical seat quota for government school students and to condemn the Edappadi K Palaniswami government for failing to get the enact the Bill.
He said it had been more than 40 days since the Tamil Nadu assembly passed the Bill unanimously during the monsoon session. However, the governor responded that he needed three to four more weeks to look into “various angles” and had sought “legal opinion” before taking a decision on the Bill, Stalin said quoting the governor’s reply to his letter.
Recollecting the cabinet’s decision to release the seven life convicts in the Rajiv Gandhi assassination case, Stalin said the governor had adopted delaying tactics in this issue too thinking that the AIADMK government would remain silent. “But the DMK and I will not remain silent. We will take all measures to materialise the Bill. Today’s protest is the beginning, and we will take forward this,” he said.
The DMK chief said the governor was an “active and vibrant” person as he had travelled across the state after assuming office. “Even it created a doubt among people whether who was the CM of the state,” Stalin said and wondered why the “active” governor needs so many days to look into the Bill to give his nod.
Taking a dig at chief minister Edappadi K Palaniswami’s statement that DMK was trying to draw political mileage over the AIADMK govt’s initiative, the opposition party leader said, “Yes, we are doing politics. And we will continue to do it for the public cause and their welfare. We will be proud of it.”
Dubbing NEET as a “bali peedam” (altar) that claimed the lives of 13 students in the state, Stalin said that when M Karunanidhi was the chief minister, he had kept NEET away from the state and Jayalalithaa had also ensured the same when she was alive. But the “subservient” and “incompetent” EPS government had miserably failed to protect the interest of the state, giving way for it.
“NEET destroyed the educational ecosystem prevailing in the state and turned education into a corporate business,” he said pointing to the mushrooming of NEET coaching centres.
“Only eight students can get medical admission if the Bill is not enacted on time,” he said and pointed out that it would destroy the dreams of 300 government school students. “It is unacceptable,” he stressed. He reiterated that DMK would take all necessary legal course of action to do away with NEET once it is voted to power.
“He (EPS) prostrated to become a CM and he remained subservient to the Centre to withhold his posting,” Stalin said and recalled that the AIADMK government passed resolution in the assembly on February 1, 2017, seeking exemption from NEET. Though the Centre returned the proposal, the ruling party kept in dark. “We came to know about this after 23 months when the government informed the court,” Stalin said and added that law minister C Ve Shanmugam had also admitted it in the assembly and said that they would not allow NEET to enter the state at any cost.
The AIADMK’s general council and its election manifesto for the 2019 Lok Sabha polls had vividly said that they would not agree for NEET. Nonetheless, the Centre imposed it and the AIADMK and its leaders remained a “slave” to them.