Top leaders start arriving in Chennai for meet over delimitation

CHENNAI: As Tamil Nadu's ruling DMK is all set to host its first meeting of states over delimitation here on March 22 and Chief Minister M K Stalin on Friday said it was more than a meeting, which marked the beginning of a movement that will shape the future of the country to achieve fair delimitation, chief ministers of non-BJP ruled states have started arriving in the city.

Kerala Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan has already arrived to take part in the meeting, to be held under the auspices of the DMK proposed Joint Action Committee (JAC) and Chief Ministers of Punjab and Telangana, Bhagwant Mann and Revanth Reddy respectively, are the leaders to descend in the city.

Kerala, Karnataka, Andhra Pradesh, Telangana, Odisha, West Bengal and Punjab are the seven states the DMK has reached out to for the meeting.

Meanwhile, the Opposition BJD in Odisha on Friday nominated two senior leaders to represent the party in the meeting of the joint action committee (JAC) on delimitation in Chennai.

The Naveen Patnaik-led BJD in a statement said that former minister Sanjay Das Burma and former MP Amar Patnaik would attend the meeting on Saturday.

Earlier on March 11, a two-member delegation of Tamil Nadu’s ruling DMK comprising TRB Rajaa and Dayanidhi Maran had met Patnaik - Odisha’s Leader of Opposition - and invited him to attend the meeting on delimitation.

The delegation also had urged Patnaik to make the BJD, which was in power in Odisha for 24 years, a part of the JAC over the Centre’s proposal for redrawing of constituencies solely on the basis of population.

Meanwhile, BJP leader Annamalai said in a social media post: "Tomorrow, while TN CM Thiru @mkstalin orchestrates his delusional drama on Delimitation, we hope he will play this speech of DMK Minister Thiru TM Anbarasan to his I.N.D.I. Alliance partners. It's as if the DMK Ministers have made a collective decision to insult and abuse our brothers and sisters of northern India."

Annamalai posted a video clip of state minister Anbarasan's purported speech, which had an "insulting" comparison, on increase in population in northern states.

The DMK regime has been at loggerheads with the BJP-led Centre over several issues including the non-release of education funds by the union government and the proposed delimitation exercise is a fresh point of disagreement.

Opposition to the National Education Policy, NEET, and alleged Hindi imposition are among the issues in which the DMK is cornering the BJP-led Centre. When the Tamil Nadu government days ago used the Tamil letter 'Roo' (for promotional material on the state budget 2025-26) to denote Rupee it led to a big debate.

Following the Enforcement Directorate's recent Rs 1,000 crore TASMAC (state-owned liquor corporation) scam allegation, the fight between the BJP and DMK appeared to be intensifying.

On March 5, 2025 Stalin had said that the 1971 population should be the basis for delimitation of LS seats for 30 years from 2026 and Prime Minister Narendra Modi should make an assurance in the Parliament.

The JAC is to take forward such demands and create awareness among the people.

Tamil Nadu's present representational percentage in Parliament, which is 7.18, should not be changed under any circumstances, the all-party meeting had urged.