Karunanidhi rejects Alagiri’s truce offer

Chennai: DMK president M. Karunanidhi on Thursday categorically rejected the conditional truce offer made by his estranged son M.K. Alagiri.

Reacting to Alagiri’s statement that situation would arise to make peace only if disciplinary action against his loyalists were dropped, Karunanidhi said the party (leadership) would not tolerate when its members lodge false PCR complaint against party district secretary and executive committee members.

The party would not be a mute spectator when complaints were lodged and the police act upon the same, Karunanidhi added. Asked about DMDK leader Premalatha Vijayakanth describing the feud in his family as a ‘family drama’, Karunanidhi said that he did not know about ‘drama’ as much as she did. 

In not greeting Alagiri on his birthday, the 90-year-old father-party chief has stated in no uncertain terms that he was in no mood to bury the hatchet. 

Next: Patch-up mood marks Alagiri b’day

Patch-up mood marks Alagiri b’day

Madurai: A note of reconciliation be­t­ween estranged son M.K.­Alagiri and his father and DMK chief M.Karunanidhi was sounded amidst the din and bustle of a ruckus cro­wd that attended the former’s birthday bash in Ma­durai on Thursday.

Though senior functio­n­aries including district secretaries and former MLAs and MPs refrained from att­ending the function, three MPs MP K.P. Ramalingam, D. Napolean and J.K. Rith­e­e­sh shared the dais with Alagiri on his 63rd birthday celebrations.

Ramalingam in a brief chat with the media said, “We are all one big DMK fa­mily. Anything such as this one (the spat between and the father and the son) will be solved very soon. Any diff­erence of opinion will be sorted out shortly for the welfare of the party. Kala­ignar is the leader for all of us."

An inside source also end­orsed his views. “Mis­und­er­standing between a father and a son is not uncommon in any household. Ever­yt­hing will be all right soon,” the source added.

This sentiment was exp­ressed by his aides who org­anised the show. But, Ala­giri remained sober as he preferred not to address his supporters despite shouts of demand from them. On the sidelines, he told the media that he would be re­ady for a rapprochement if his loyalists in Madurai we­re reinstated.

He said President Pranab Mukherjee, mother Dayalu Ammal, sister Selvi, brother Tamilarasu, actors Raj­nikanth and Prabhu be­si­des scores of his friends and well-wishers in the sta­te and abroad wished him on his birthday. He, however, said neither his dad nor his younger brother Stalin greeted him.

Much prominence was given to Karunanidhi in the posters and flexes un­like a few days ago and the DMK flags fluttered across the city. Though young bo­ys, aged between 16 and 25, clad in jean and tees outnumbered the cadres, a suspended DMK functionary claimed, “About 10,000 par­ty workers who were affected by the irregularities in the organisational polls acr­oss the state took part in the bash to show their dissent.”

The unruly crowd on the dais threw the remains at eneficiaries and mediapersons after Alagiri cut a hu­ge cake and offered a slice to his son Durai Dayanithi. A scuffle erupted between two groups of men right on the stage and the speakers and mikes were broken in the melee. Women in Ala­giri’s family including wife Kanthi who otherwise used to participate in the celebrations at the public venue confined themselves to the cake-cutting ceremony in his residence.