In clashes over Jaya portrait, TN councillors hit new low CoimbatoreMadurai: TIMES NEWS NETWORK Councillors of AIADMK and DMK in Coimbatore and Madurai clashed in the council halls on Wednesday, with members of the ruling party showing their loyalty to J Jayalalithaa by refusing to take down her portrait and their DMK counterparts insisting that party chief M Karunanidhi be extended the same honour. The controversy over a portrait of the former CM adorning the walls of the council hall in Coimbatore took an unexpected twist on Wednesday , when DMK councillors attempted to bring in a portrait of Karunanidhi. Marshals stopped them and led them out but the DMK councillors would not go gently. Arguing with the policemen, they reluctantly withdrew to hold a rival council meeting outside the hall. The decorum of the council in Madurai plunged to a new low, with a woman AIADMK councillor hurling her handbag at DMK members who were protesting to mayor V V Rajan Chellappa against the ruling party publishing Jayalalithaas photograph in a booklet on a new drinking water project. Other AIADMK members immediately took the cue and started to throw sweets and snacks at the DMK councillors. “When someone is convicted by a court, how can her photograph appear in corporation booklet,“ M L Raj, former DMK floor leader in the council (but dismissed from the party for supporting M K Alagiri) asked mayor Chellappa. It did not help matters that the mayor had an image of Jayalalithaa pinned to his ceremonial robe, which clearly riled the DMK councillors even more. The ruckus started with the AIADMK majority council adopting several resolutions that levelled accusations against Karunanidhi.DMK councillors, who have either boycotted council meetings or been ousted from the meetings for the past three years, chose to stay despite the resolutions. But pandemonium broke out when they demanded to know why AIADMK used Jayalalithaas image in the booklet. A senior official of Madurai corporation said the booklet was about a project to draw water from Mullaperiyar to Madurai, which the government had taken up when Jayalalithaa was chief minister.He said they had published the booklet before her conviction. DMK councillors in Coimbatore had submitted a petition to the mayor a week ago demanding that Jayalalithas portrait. “Either Jayalalithas photo should be removed or the corporation should put up portraits of all former chief ministers,“ DMK councillor Meena Loganathan said. Similar scenes unfolded in council meetings in Karur, Trichy and in Manapparai municipality .
Posted on: Thu, 13 Nov 2014 02:22:55 +0000
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