Tamil Nadu CM Stalin Attends Raj Bhavan Tea Party Event Despite DMK Boycott
Chennai: A day after the DMK announced that the party would give the Raj Bhavan tea party on Independence Day a miss, Chief Minister M K Stalin attended the event on Thursday evening, along with a few of his senior colleagues, and exchanged pleasantries with Governor R N Ravi, whose actions were cited as reasons for the boycott called by the DMK allies in the State.
The Chief Minister and a couple of senior Ministers were closeted with the Governor inside the Raj Bhavan for some time before joining the other invitees of the traditional ‘At Home’ ceremony at the pandal set up on the lawns, where the Governor welcomed everyone present there.
Representatives of the BJP’s allies and also the AIADMK attended the party, while the Congress, CPI, CPM, VCK and MDMK kept off the event expressing resentment over the Governor’s actions like not approving Bills passed by the State Assembly and other things.
The decision of the Chief Minister to attend the party is seen as an attempt to thaw the frozen relationship between the Governor and the DMK government that is reportedly planning to go for a cabinet reshuffle and induct new Ministers into the Cabinet.
Since the Chief Minister is planning to go on a tour of the United States to lure investments soon, he might have felt that it would not be prudent to antagonize the Governor at this point of time. In fact the DMK has not been critical of the Governor in the recent past, apparently in a bid to have a cordial relationship between the government and Raj Bhavan.
However, in his Independence Day message, Ravi took a swipe at the State administration saying that drugs were easily available in schools and colleges and that hooch tragedies were causing the death of poor people, which are regular charges made by the opposition parties particularly the AIADMK and BJP.
He also made a mention about rampant social discrimination against Dalits and called upon women to be proactive against illicit liquor and drugs, besides urging enforcement agencies to crack the whip on bootleggers and ensure bootleggers get severe punishment for their crime.