Chennai, Aug 16 (PTI) Describing the delay in implementing the women’s reservation to increase the number of seats in Lok Sabha as an “insult” to women, senior DMK leader EVKS Elangovan on Sunday insisted that the Centre should implement the quota in the existing strength of the House.
He also accused Prime Minister Narendra Modi of “cheating” people on the issue of women’s reservation, as “the women’s reservation bill was introduced by a Congress-led government in the past and it was the BJP that opposed the Bill at that time”.
Speaking to PTI Videos, Elangovan also slammed the TVK-led government in Tamil Nadu for its performance in its first 100 days.
He criticised the Centre’s rationale of linking the 33 per cent quota to an increase in parliamentary seats. “They should implement women’s reservation in the existing seats,” Elangovan said, calling the delay to increase seat numbers an “insult to women”.
Turning his guns on Chief Minister C Joseph Vijay, he criticised the allegedly poor administrative performance of TVK’s first 100-days of government by calling it “nothing”.
Elangovan alleged that the TVK government had only managed to change the names of existing schemes. “Their only ideology is to attack DMK every way”.
Responding to CM Vijay’s claims of defeating a conspiracy against his government, Elangovan pointed out that the administration lacks an absolute majority and heavily relies on parties that won in the DMK alliance. He warned that these supporting parties could withdraw their backing if the government fails to deliver on its promises.
Elangovan also attacked CM Vijay for targeting DMK chief M K Stalin while the senior leader was not present in the House. He asserted that Vijay is “happy that Stalin is not there” because he could not answer him.
According to him, “Vijay is incapable of spontaneous political debate”, stating that the chief minister is “not a well-prepared man” who merely “reads out whatever is given to him in writing”. Elangovan contrasted his behaviour with the political decency shown by former chief ministers and iconic leaders like C N Annadurai toward K Kamaraj.
Addressing the controversy surrounding the rendition of the full version of Vande Mataram at the Congress headquarters, Elangovan said that Senior leader Sonia Gandhi was right in objecting to the rendition of the full song. He said that Sonia Gandhi’s stand on the song aligns with the Constituent Assembly’s resolution at the time of Independence that only certain portions of the song be sung. PTI JR ADB
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