Minister for Youth Welfare and Sports Development Udhayanidhi Stalin on Saturday said that he had not used any uncivil words against Union Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman.
“Is appan [father] an uncivil word? I do not know,” he said, when asked about his remarks that the State government was seeking financial assistance from the Centre and not a share in the property of the Finance Minister’s “appan”.
Reacting to his comments, Ms. Sitharaman had said that an emerging politician and the grandson of a Tamil scholar should be very careful about his choice of words.
“I have corrected myself… Let me say honourable ‘appa’ of the Union Finance Minister…,” Mr. Udhayanidhi quipped. Citing a social media post, he said: “Ms. Sitharaman has failed to see the flood as a disaster because the nine-and-half-year rule of the BJP itself is a major disaster.”
On complaints about the relief work being sluggish in Kayalpattinam, Mr. Udhayanidhi said he went there two days ago and was taken to the severely affected places. “Water was stagnated in many areas. We had brought in more pumps to drain the water and distributed food. Eral in Thoothukudi is the worst-hit area. I have asked Minister for Municipal Administration K.N. Nehru to visit these places again. Officials are camping there and Minister for Commercial Taxes P. Moorthy has been put in charge of relief works,” he said.
Reacting to another comment of Ms. Sitharaman that the NDRF teams had visited the flood-hit areas before the State government representatives, Mr. Udhayanidhi said he went to his constituency even before it started raining in Chennai. “When heavy rain lashed the southern districts, I was in Salem. I went there first instead of going to Chennai,” he said.
He added Chief Minister M.K. Stalin was in Delhi in connection with an INDIA bloc meeting and an appointment with the Prime Minister to get relief. “He went to the southern districts immediately after returning from Delhi,” he said.