Vijay Comes Under Attack From Rivals

Chennai: Leaders of rival parties, DMK’s MK Stalin, AIADMK general secretary Edappadi K Palaniswami and opposition leader Udhayanidhi Stalin launched a scathing attack on Chief Minister C Joseph Vijay at different forums on various issues on Saturday.

While addressing a meeting of DMK’s women’s wing, Stalin said that Vijay was merely working as a Xerox copy of the BJP and was stealing MLAs from the party, which he described as “spent force” (AIADMK).

Stating that the new government could be given time to implement its poll promises but lapses in safety and security could not be tolerated, he said DMK would function as a responsible and aware opposition party.

He claimed that Vijay’s speech at the NITI Aayog meeting in New Delhi was a copy of the DMK’s demands during his tenure and the only change was that while the DMK had set a target of becoming a US$ 1 trillion economy by 2030, the TVK government had revised it to US$ 1.5 trillion by 2026.

Udhayanidhi Stalin said that Vijay was putting stickers on DMK’s achievements and presenting them as his own. Despite traveling all the way to New Delhi, Vijay did not speak out about Karnataka’s threat to build the Mekedatu dam along the Cauvery River.

AIADMK general secretary Palaniswami also accused Vijay of passively watching Karnataka’s efforts to build the Mekedatu dam and said the TVK, which has brought credibility to the Congress by taking its members into its Cabinet, should put pressure on the Karnataka government not to build the dam, which would affect the flow of Cauvery water to Tamil Nadu.

Stating that the TVK government should also insist that Karnataka share Cauvery water as per Supreme Court orders, he expressed regret that the State government had made no effort to release Cauvery water from Mettur reservoir to irrigate crops grown during Kuruvai season.