KARUR: Chief Minister Edappadi K. Palaniswami slammed V. Senthil Balaji, who is among 18 MLAs disqualified by the Speaker, for “betraying the AIADMK and the government” and for joining hands with “those taking the MLAs on a “wrong path.”
“He (Senthil Balaji) has earned a bad name for Karur district. He had delivered the unkindest cut by betraying the party and the government and despite all of us working hard for his victory in the election, he has remained ungrateful too,” Palaniswami said on Wednesday. He was addressing a huge gathering here at a function got up to commemorate the birth centenary of party founder M.G. Ramachandran.
He also recalled how the entire party machinery geared up following instruction from late Chief Minister J. Jayalalithaa and strove hard for the victory of Senthil Balaji, former transport minister, in the Aravakurichi election.
The CM also lashed out at TTV Dhinakaran for “misleading” the disqualified MLAs and said, “some people are clinging on to an erroneous person and heading towards a wrong direction. We will rescue them and bring them back into our fold.”
Narrating a tale he said in a frantic bid to cross a river in spate, a man held on to a goat’s tail, but as the animal could not swim overburdened by his weight, the two were carried away by the waves.
“Like this, some people are treading the wrong path clinging on to an erroneous person. I need not say who, you know whom I mean,” Palaniswami said amidst thunderous applause by the party workers.
Turning to the opposition DMK, he said some vested interest persons were politicising the conduct of functions marking the birth centenary of MGR.
“We are not afraid of anyone in order to serve the people. We are not accountable to them as we are dedicated to serving the people. Serving the humanity is serving the god, and we will not deviate. It is enough if we have the people’s support,” he emphasised.
Palaniswami dedicated Rs 26 crore worth new projects and announced several new schemes for Karur district following a plea by State transport minister M.R. Vijayabaskar, including ordering the feasibility study for constructing new check dam across river Cauvery between Pugalur in Karur District and near Nanjai Edayar in Namakkal District, new ring road for Karur town, new road overbridge on Karur-Erode-Coimbatore road junction.
