Chennai: DMK President and former Tamil Nadu Chief Minister M.K. Stalin on Sunday launched a sharp attack on CM C. Joseph Vijay, questioning the latter’s recent visit to New Delhi and accusing him of adopting a different standard from the one he had applied to political opponents in the past.
Stalin recalled remarks allegedly made by Vijay when the DMK was in power, and Stalin had travelled to the national capital.
According to the DMK leader, Vijay had then accused him of visiting Delhi to escape scrutiny in Enforcement Directorate (ED) cases and had alleged that the DMK had entered into an indirect understanding with the BJP.
“Whenever I travelled to Delhi as Chief Minister, the present Chief Minister made several allegations. He claimed that I had gone there to escape ED cases and suggested that I had fallen at the feet of the BJP to secure political favours,” Stalin said.
Referring to Vijay’s recent Delhi visit, Stalin posed a series of questions to the Chief Minister. “What have you done now? Did you go to Delhi to escape the Karur CBI case? Are you afraid to criticise the BJP because you fear it could create problems for your government?” he asked.
Stalin said the questions were intended to highlight what he described as the inconsistency in Vijay’s political rhetoric.
He argued that the allegations being raised now mirrored the accusations that had previously been directed at the DMK leadership.
At the same time, the former Chief Minister said he would not resort to the kind of personal criticism that, according to him, Vijay had employed in the past.
Stalin maintained that attending official government events in the national capital was part of a Chief Minister’s responsibilities and should not automatically be viewed through a political lens.
“I will not lower my standards by making derogatory remarks about the Chief Minister merely because he attended an official government programme in Delhi,” Stalin said.
The comments come amid an intensifying political confrontation between the ruling TVK-led government and the opposition DMK, with both sides increasingly trading accusations over their respective relationships with the BJP and the Union government.
(IANS)
