Late Jayalalithaa Would Have Never Supported CAA: DMK Leader MK Kanimozhi

DMK leader MK Kanimozhi on Saturday while commenting about the controversial Citizenship Act said if late chief minister J Jayalalithaa would have been there today she would not have supported the new law. Responding to a question about the legacy of Jayalalithaa at Kerala Literature Festival (KLF) in Kozhikode, she said, “if Jayalalithaa was at the helm of affairs in the party, I’d like to believe that she would not have supported the CAA,” she said.

“She’s not left a legacy even in her own party. That’s the sad part. Whatever she stood for, her party is failing her. Her party has left Tamil Nadu, the country and their own leader down,” The Indian Express quoted Kanimozhi as saying.

“She has not left an ideological legacy. She has left a void in her party. We have a lot of differences with Jayalalithaa. We did not agree on her way of administration, but at least she believed in state rights,” she added.

DMK against Citizenship Act

In December last year, DMK and its allies took out a huge protest rally against the amendment to the Citizenship Act and warned of intensifying the agitation by mobilising apolitical sections of society till the Centre withdrew the ‘draconian’ law. The DMK has been maintaining that the law was anti-Muslim and Sri Lankan Tamils.

Alleging that the ruling AIADMK tried to thwart the rally “by approaching the court,” he said the court, however, negated it and ruled there was no bar on holding the agitation.

According to the amended Act, members of Hindu, Sikh, Buddhist, Jain, Parsi and Christian communities who have come from Pakistan, Bangladesh and Afghanistan till December 31, 2014 and face religious persecution there will not be treated as illegal immigrants but given Indian citizenship. President Ram Nath Kovind had given assent to the Citizenship (Amendment) Bill, 2019, turning it into an Act.

On culmination of the rally, Stalin in a brief address said the protest was not a march of party workers but a battalion determined to fight against the CAA.

“I bow to the Tamil people for taking part in the rally and expressing your sentiments (against the CAA),” he said.

The DMK chief, flanked by Chidambaram and other leaders on the dais, said the opposition to CAA will not stop with today’s agitation.

The protests will be taken forward after consulting allies and by mobilising apolitical sections of the society till such time the Centre withdrew the “draconian,” legislation, he said.