The Hindu : MDMK delegation calls on PM

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Thursday, Jan 23, 2003

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MDMK delegation calls on PM

By Our Special Correspondent

NEW DELHI Jan. 22 . A delegation of senior leaders of the Marumalarchi Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (MDMK) today called on the Prime Minister, A.B.Vajpayee, and submitted a representation expressing the concern of the people of Tamil Nadu over the continued detention of Vaiko and eight other frontline functionaries of the party under the POTA.

Emphasising that the representation did not seek any action, the leader of the delegation and MDMK Chairman, L.Ganesan said the representation merely brought to the attention of the Prime Minister the anguish of the people of Tamil Nadu over the "undemocratic'' and "unjust'' arrest and detention of Mr.Vaiko and others.

"We are not asking for any action. It is for the Prime Minister and the Central Government to take or not take any action. We only wanted to draw his attention to the concern of the people of Tamil Nadu over the vindictive attitude of the State Chief Minister, Jayalalithaa and the fascist methods adopted by her to curb the basic civil liberties of opposition parties''. The representation, he noted, was signed by over one crore people drawn from different walks of life. Leaders of all parties, except the AIADMK, had signed the representation. The first signature was affixed by the DMK president, M.Karunanidhi.

"The stupendous spontaneous response to the signature campaign, which lasted for just three weeks, clearly demonstrates that the people of Tamil Nadu are agitated over the gross abuse of POTA to settle political scores and wreak political vendetta'', he added.

In a memorandum presented on the occasion, the leaders emphasised that Mr.Vaiko did not propogate the establishment of a support base for the LTTE in India in his speech, for which the case has been registered under the POTA. He, they said, had only quoted from his own speech about the LTTE made during the course of a parliamentary debate on Gujarat. Considering that the LTTE has been recognised by the international community as the sole representative of the Eelam Tamils, it would not at all be possible to speak about their problems without referring to LTTE.

The leaders are scheduled to call on the President, A.P.J.Abdul Kalam, tomorrow. Besides Mr. Ganesan, the delegation included the Union Ministers of State, M.Kannappan, and Gingee N.Ramachandran. The other members were: Nazareth Durai, MDMK deputy general secretary and C.Krishnan, MP.

Mr. Ganesan announced that a joint meeting of party district secretaries, parliamentary board and the political advisory body, would be held in Chennai on February 1 to discuss the next course of action.

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