M Karunanidhi flays Jayalalithaa over jallikattu issue
In 2009, the DMK had enacted a law for regulating the sport, he said in the statement.
Madurai: Charging the AIADMK government for not taking concrete steps to conduct ‘jallikattu’, the DMK chief M Karunanidhi assured the electorates to revive the bull-taming sport if his party was elected to power in the May 16 Assembly elections.
Countering the AIADMK supremo, J Jayalalithaa’s accusation against the DMK for allegedly betraying the Tamil people on this issue, Karunanidhi said that his party has been taking consistent steps since 2007 for conducting the ‘Jallikattu’.
Elaborating it further, he said that then DMK government had conduct the sport under the direct supervision of officials after the ban imposed against ‘jallikattu’ by the court was removed in 2007. In 2009, the DMK had enacted a law for regulating the sport, he said in the statement.
However, after the Supreme Court imposed the ban against ‘jallikattu’ in May 2014, the ruling AIADMK government did not take steps for the conduct of sports during the annual ‘Pongal’ festival in January. If Jayalalithaa was seriously concerned about lifting the ban, she should have impressed upon the Prime Minister Narendra Modi when he visited her house in Chennai in August 2015, he said.
Even in the petition Jayalalithaa had submitted to the Prime
Minister, she had not mentioned that the bull could be used as a performing animal, claimed Karunanidhi, adding that it was because of the negligence on the part of Chief Minister, Jayalalithaa, ‘jallikattu’ could not be held in 2015, claimed Karunanidhi. “If people vote the DMK to power, we will impress upon the Central government to conduct ‘jallikattu’,” he added.