Don’t blame others for your fault, Annamalai hits back at Ponmudy

CHENNAI: A day after state Higher Education Minister K Ponmudy claimed that India’s sea ports at Mundra in Gujarat and Vijayawada in Andhra Pradesh have become porous for drug smuggling after the ports were privatised, BJP state president K Annamalai on Friday alleged that the DMK government was blaming the Centre and other states for its inability to control smuggling of drugs into Tamil Nadu.

In a statement, he said that Tamil Nadu has become India’s ganja capital and after DMK came to power, ganja was freely available across the state.

“In 2020, 115 kg of heroin and ATS were seized by the Narcotic Control Bureau in Thoothukudi port. Is Thoothukudi port a private one? Was the Minister not aware of the seizure of 1,238.84 kg of drugs in Tamil Nadu till November 2021? Did the Minister forget the seizure of 21 kg of heroin in Thoothukudi in December last year?” he asked.

Annamalai also noted that the number of persons arrested for selling drugs had gone up from 771 in December 2020 to 1,558 in 2021. The Minister, who took pride in his government’s achievement of arresting more people in drug related cases should realise that only after the DMK came to power that drugs are freely available across the state, he said. Annamalai demanded the DMK to stop blaming Centre for hiding their inability and sought closure of liquor brewing units owned by the DMK leaders.