We pressured DMK to start up income scheme: Palaniswami
Taking credit for the implementation of Magalir Urimai Thogai under which ₹1,000 is given every month to women heads of families, AIADMK general secretary Edappadi K. Palaniswami said on Wednesday that it was only after his party kept up pressuring the government that the scheme got off the ground, 27 months after the DMK came to power.
Addressing AIADMK functionaries of the Edappadi Assembly constituency, he said the DMK government’s narrative of the scheme was false. “How did they give it? I spoke about this in the Assembly several times, as well as at the party’s general body meeting. I pressured the government to implement the scheme,” he said.
Mr. Palaniswami, while campaigning for AIADMK Salem candidate P. Vignesh, said DMK workers were threatening women that the monthly assistance would be stopped if they did not allow them to use the walls of their houses for political advertising. “We won’t allow the scheme to be stopped,” he said.
He said the DMK had fulfilled less than 10% of its election promises, and stopping the schemes introduced by the AIADMK government was its only achievement. “They did not keep their promises and stopped our schemes. This is the achievement in three years of the ‘Dravidian Model’ of governance,” he said. Mr. Palaniswami alleged that the scheme to divert surplus water from the Mettur dam to 100 waterbodies in the region was stopped by the DMK government. Owing to the severe drought conditions, there might be a shortage of water for drinking and farming. “Had they completed the scheme in one year, all the waterbodies could have been filled up by now,” he said. Without naming T.M. Selvaganapathi, the DMK candidate for
Salem, Mr. Palaniswami said, “He left the AIADMK and is the Opposition candidate now. The AIADMK cadre worked hard for his victory in Tiruchengodu in 1991 and former Chief Minister Jayalalithaa made him a Minister. Since the DMK has no candidates, it is poaching people from the AIADMK.”
The DMK is responsible for the “free flow of drugs” that has ruined the lives of several people, Mr. Palaniswami said in Karur. Canvassing for AIADMK candidate K.R.L. Thangavel, he said the DMK government had failed to act against those smuggling and selling drugs. Some of the accused persons, who were arrested by the Narcotics Control Bureau, were operating freely, he said.
He criticised Chief Minister M.K. Stalin for backing former Minister V. Senthilbalaji, who is lodged in the Puzhal Central Prison in a ‘cashforjobs’ scam case. He said that when Mr. Stalin was the Leader of the Opposition, he had levelled serious allegations against Mr. Senthilbalaji. “He [Mr. Stalin] had vowed to jail him for his misdeeds. But now he is calling Mr. Senthilbalaji a great party worker. The people are watching the drama and will teach a fitting lesson to the DMK in the Lok Sabha election,” he added.