Rivals lock horns in House over Vijayakanth’s bravado

CHENNAI: Heated exchanges erupted between the ruling AIADMK and the DMDK with some senior ministers, led by chief minister J Jayalalithaa, taking on DMDK MLA K Pandiarajan for singing paeans to his party chief Vijayakanth. The face-off in the state assembly comes in the wake of four DMDK MLAs shifting loyalties to the ruling AIADMK.
It all started when Pandiarajan gushed about the brave demeanor of Vijayakanth, prompting Jayalalithaa to react sarcastically.“Is that the person, with no fear of anything, who has moved the court for anticipatory bail?” she asked, sending treasury benches into peels of laughter. It was an apparent reference to Vijayakanth, who, apprehending arrest in the case of abuse and intimidation of a journalist at Chennai airport last week, moved the Madras high court for anticipatory bail. The journalist was seeking his reaction to four of his party MLAs, including R Sundararajan, K Tamil Azhagan, Arun Pandian and Michael Rayappan, switching camps.
Housing minister R Vaithialingam stood up to say that the DMDK chief lacked patience. DMDK members protested loudly against the minister’s remarks and were persistent in their demand that the speaker expunge them. “Everyone knows what he (Vijayakanth) did that day at the Meenambakkam airport. We know all about your leader,” social welfare minister B Valarmathi said, leading to pandemonium in the hall.