All eyes on Guv as House meets today

CHENNAI: A year after walking out of the State Assembly after Chief Minister M K Stalin moved a resolution against his selective deviation from the prepared speech, Governor RN Ravi will return to the House on Monday to deliver the customary speech to mark the beginning of proceedings for the first time in 2024.

The unprecedented incident that worsened the relationship between Raj Bhavan and Fort St George has piqued curiosity among the people and political observers as to what would transpire this time around, especially with the general election just around the corner.

The incident on January 9 last year was the fallout of a long-standing face-off between the Governor and the government over various issues, and the ideological differences between the two.

Governor Ravi selectively omitted certain portions and names from the speech that the State government had prepared. This included parts that praised the Dravidian Model of governance of the ruling partand the names of stalwarts like Thanthai Periyar (E V Ramasamy), Annal Ambedkar (BR Ambedkar), Perunthalaivar Kamarajar (K Kamaraj), Perarignar Anna (CN Annadurai) and Muthamizh Arignar Kalaignar (M Karunanidhi).

Disapproving the Governor’s speech for omitting certain portions of the prepared speech and going extempore, Chief Minister Stalin moved a resolution to ignore the speech and record the government-prepared speech in the Assembly record. Soon after realising what was going on, the visibly upset Governor stormed out of the Assembly.

Now, all eyes are on the Governor to see how it all would play out on an election year.