The DMK government should take steps to ensure that there was no load shedding in the State and refrain from blaming others in the event of any problem of power shortage, the AIADMK coordinator. O Panneerselvam said on Thursday.
In a statement, he referred to reports in a section of the media, which said Electricity Minister V. Senthil Balaji sought to blame the Centre for disruptions in power supply, just as Local Administration Minister K.N. Nehru held the Centre responsible for the recent hike in property tax. Mr. Balaji was reported to have accused the Union government of showing bias against the State in providing coal linkage because of which the State had to float bids for coal purchase to meet the shortfall.
Contending that the position of the Electricity Minister was not acceptable, Mr. Panneerselvam said there were already reports of several places in the State, suffering disruption in power supply for one hour and some of them even having blackout. The AIADMK leader called upon Chief Minister M.K. Stalin to ensure that the State had uninterrupted power supply.
The party co-coordinator, Edappadi K. Palaniswami, in an interaction with reporters outside the Assembly, termed the High Court’s decision of upholding the 7.5% quota for students of government schools in the admission to medical courses as a “boon.” He condemned the arrest of former Law Minister C. Ve. Shanmugam, who attempted to observe a fast in Villupuram.
