Kiran Bedi’s water crisis remarks echo in Assembly, DMK demands her removal

Chennai/Puducherry: DMK president M K Stalin led a walkout of his legislators from the Assembly on Monday after Speaker P Dhanapal did not allow him to raise the remarks by Puducherry Lieutenant Governor Kiran Bedi on the water scarcity here. The DMK chief also wanted Bedi to withdraw her comments and apologise, and urged President Ram Nath Kovind to recall her from Puducherry.

Speaking on a calling attention motion on the water crisis, Stalin wanted to refer to Bedi's remarks but Speaker Dhanapal did not allow him citing Assembly rules that forbade discussions about Governor. Condemning the remarks by Bedi, Stalin led his party members in staging a walkout. Comments made by him and Law Minister C V Shanmugam on the issue were expunged by the Chair.

Referring to a media report on Chennai's water crisis, Bedi had tweeted on Sunday that the city became the first in the country to have gone dry and that too just four years after it witnessed floods due to copious rains. The people's perception, in response to the report, was that the situation arose due to “poor governance, corrupt politics and indifferent bureaucracy,” she had said.

On Monday, she stressed that she had only shared the people's perception. “It is not my personal view and hence there is nothing personal in the message,” she added.

Stalin told reporters outside the Assembly after his walk-out protest that Bedi's remarks were “uncivilized and insulted the people of TN”. She had on her twitter handle blamed “poor governance, corrupt politics, indifferent bureaucracy and highly selfish and cowardly attitude of the people for the Chennai water crisis”, said Stalin, adding that it might be tolerable if she had criticised political parties but her remarks were against the Tamil people and that cannot be accepted.
“Her comments are condemnable. We will not accept them for any reason and staged walkout from the House”, he said.

Later in a statement, Stalin demanded that Bedi withdraw her comments and apologise to the people of Tamil Nadu. “Only then the dignity of her office will be saved,” he said, urging the President to remove her from the office immediately and make everyone understand the values of Indian Constitution. “Tamil Nadu people are compassionate and patriotic,” he said. They lent a helping hand to people in need of support anywhere in the country and donated liberally during times of war and several soldiers from the state are martyred everyday in defending the borders of the nation, he added.

Meanwhile, the AIADMK party unit in Puducherry said it would urge the Centre to take action against Bedi. Both the AIADMK and DMK in the Union territory have announced protests against her. Asking Bedi to withdraw her remarks, the AIADMK said it will hold protests, while the DMK said it will organise a “lay siege to Raj Nivas,” protest on Tuesday.