Date:01/05/2003 URL: http://www.thehindu.com/2003/05/01/stories/2003050105490100.htm

Southern States - Tamil Nadu

Now, for an editorial

By Our Special Correspondent

Chennai April 30. A week after slapping a privilege issue on The Hindu for three of its reports, the Tamil Nadu Assembly Speaker, K. Kalimuthu, today referred a recent editorial of the newspaper to the Privileges Committee.

The Speaker charged that the editorial, "Rising intolerance", published on April 25, had commented on the Chief Minister, Jayalalithaa's "new way of attacking political opponents", imputed motives to his actions and tarnished the entire Assembly, its members and the Privileges Committee.

Reading out from a prepared text, Mr. Kalimuthu said he had referred three reports published in The Hindu to the Privileges Committee (on April 23) as they contained certain phrases "contrary to truth and with a motive" to defame the Chief Minister, who was the "leader of a majority of the MLAs" and "most important member" in the Assembly. "That is why I referred the reports to the Privileges Committee which functions independently," he explained.

However, the editorial "criticised and imputed motives to the Speaker's action and stated that the verdict of the Privileges Committee, considering its composition, would go according to the thinking of the ruling party", Mr. Kalimuthu said. "This amounts to imputing motives and bringing grave disrepute to the functioning of the Privileges Committee and also the entire Assembly."

The Speaker also slapped a privilege issue on the DMK organ, Murasoli, which had published a Tamil translation of the editorial.

The Speaker's ruling came seconds after an unattached MLA, C.K. Thamizharasan, raising a privilege issue under Rule 219, strongly criticised the editorial and said it denigrated the Privileges Committee, which had the Chief Minister as its member. However, the Treasury Benches quickly clarified that the Chief Minister was not a member of the committee. Then, L. Santhanam of the Forward Bloc seconded the motion.

Immediately, the Speaker threw the issue open to the House for a discussion. But there was stoic silence from both the Opposition and the Treasury Benches, and Mr. Kalimuthu, under Rule 226, read out a prepared statement, referring suo motu the editorial to the Privileges Committee.