The Makkal Neethi Maiam (MNM) would field more women candidates in the 2021 Assembly elections than any other party, said its president Kamal Haasan in Theni on Monday.
Interacting with party functionaries, Mr. Haasan said that the number of women voters in Tamil Nadu was higher than men. “If this is to be taken as a yardstick, then women voters would decide who should emerge victorious in every constituency. Who would form the government..and so on,” he said.
In an apparent reference to AIADMK leader O. Panneerselvam’s recent remarks that women and men should govern the State for two-and-a-half years each, he said that if this was [projected as] the ruling party’s stand, then here (in Theni), the father was an MLA and his son an MP.
Claiming that the MNM would not simply preach, he said that the party would give more opportunity to women candidates. There were at least 20 women achievers in MNM, according to him. A majority of the women, he said, were described as homemakers in Tamil Nadu. When many of them donned the role of daughter, wife, mother, sister and friend, they deserved more in public life. “If elected, we will give the governance to women and the youth. In their hands, it would be safe and responsible,” he added.
Many people termed politics as gutter. “We in the MNM will change the nomenclature. It is just a matter of time. We will give a new meaning to politics,” he said. Without naming the Dravidian parties, he asked why parties were not appointing women as party district secretaries.
The MNM leader, who began his second day tour from Madurai, travelled by road to Usilampatti, where he inaugurated the party office and reached Theni by noon. The party cadres accorded a rousing reception at Andipatti. Later in the evening, he addressed the functionaries at a mandapam in Dindigul district.
