Southern States - Tamil Nadu

AIADMK MP joins issue with women's forum

By Our Special Correspondent

CHENNAI May 10. An AIADMK Member of Parliament, V. Saroja, today joined issue with the National Federation of Indian Women (NFIW) for adopting a resolution criticising Ms. Jayalalithaa's stand on the Gujarat debate in Parliament.

In an open letter to the NFIW president, Dina Pathak, Ms. Saroja said: ``The conclusion is inevitable — that your resolution against the Tamil Nadu Chief Minister, Jayalalithaa, is biased and politically motivated and is not based on equity as such''.

The AIADMK MP said: ``it would be helpful if you can clarify whether the resolution was part of the hidden agenda of the NFIW's Chennai session''.

Ms. Saroja said that ``in the ambience of all these, there is a fatal flaw in your resolution that you have not found it necessary to criticise one of the so-called `secular' parties — DMK. This is indeed intriguing. When you found it fit to criticise Ms. Jayalalithaa for instructing her MPs to abstain from voting, how is it that you have not found it necessary to condemn the DMK which actually voted against the resolution''

Noting that it did not ``behove an organisation like the NFIW to make such presumptive remarks about the AIADMK, knowing the party's efforts to place the rights of women ever in the forefront and with Ms. Jayalalithaa's ceaseless efforts for doing all she can for the development of women, particularly women belonging to the minorities'', Ms. Saroja highlighted some of the steps taken by the AIADMK Government in Tamil Nadu to improve the lot of women.

With particular reference to the stand of the AIADMK on the Gujarat issue, she said that it was Ms. Jayalalithaa who was ``forthright in her condemnation of the violence in Gujarat. She alone among the leaders of the country left the decision to quit to the Chief Minister, Narendra Modi, himself. Being the Chief Minister of Tamil Nadu, Ms. Jayalalithaa felt it was not ethical to demand his dismissal. She firmly believes it would be an unbecoming constitutional transgression for the Chief Minister of one State to demand the dismissal of another Chief Minister''.

As for the ``inference-cum-innuendo'' on the abstention — that it was with ``eyes set on entry into the NDA'', Ms. Saroja recalled how the AIADMK had withdrawn its Ministers from the previous Vajpayee Government and finally withdrew support to it.

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