Chennai, March 10 Tamil Nadu BJP ridiculed Chief Minister M K Stalin's remark that the BJP wanted to "saffronize" the state, and said it was former Chief Minister M Karunanidhi who had planned it in 1999.
Referring to the DMK president's comment at the party's 12th conference in Tiruchirappalli on March 9, Tamil Nadu BJP's chief spokesperson Narayanan Thirupathy said, "It was your father who planned to make Tamil Nadu a saffron state in 1999."
He was apparently referring to the DMK joining the NDA then led by A B Vajpayee in 1999. Following the NDA's victory in that election, the DMK leaders were provided berths in the Vajpayee cabinet.
"They are planning to somehow make Tamil Nadu a saffron country. As long as there is a black-red crowd (of the DMK), no matter who comes, it will not happen," Stalin said in the conference.
"It was your father who planned to make Tamil Nadu a saffron state in 1999," Thirupathy said in a post on the social media platform ‘X.’
In a lighter vein, the BJP leader remarked that the colours black and red (colours of the DMK flag) are synonymous with the dress code of Ayyappa devotees and Om Shakti devotees - the ones who support saffron.
Addressing the conference, Stalin alleged that AIADMK chief Edappadi K Palaniswami, out of selfishness and in order to become CM, turned into the BJP's "slave" and mortgaged the party in Delhi. Using Palaniswami, the BJP was trying to "destroy the entire AIADMK," he alleged.
A 'Saffron crowd,' an obvious reference to the BJP, wants to "swallow Tamil Nadu", and DMK will not allow it to happen, Stalin had asserted.