Chennai: After the ruling DMK's first family, Tamil Nadu Finance Minister Planivel Thiagarajan appears to be the new target of BJP president K Annamalai. The saffron leader released yet another purported audio clip, in which PTR is heard blaming the way the DMK functions and expressing his intention to quit.
“In the short term, I get out before the shit starts bursting in their face. Cleanliness of my conscience that I did not have to like it wasn't I gave up the fight too early. I don't have to say it,” the speaker is heard saying, indicating his intention to resign. This gives credence to his earlier tweet about quitting and writing a memoir. Then he says “I have been a long-time proponent of one-man-one post from the day I entered politics. It is what I like about the BJP. Who looks after the party and who looks after the people? Separate those ...right?”
While what is admirable about the saffron party's money management is a sleight of hand, he says the DMK's model is not sustainable. “Oh...it is easier to do money management. It is not a system...they are taking the bulk of the spoils. The party which is the CM's son and son-in-law... Ask them to make the financing...right... so after watching this for 8 months I decided that this is not a sustainable model,” is heard in the audio. Interestingly, there is no explicit mention of the DMK and it rests on inference. The indication is that the DMK doesn't have clear-cut roles and responsibilities.
Also read: DMK Files: " No question of apology or paying damages," says Annamalai
This is the second audio, claimed to be a leak of a conversation of PTR with another person. This comes close on the heels of releasing a purported audio clip of PTR in which Chief Minister MK Stalin's son and Minister Udhayanidhi and son-in-law V Sabareesan are blamed for having amassed money in a year that their grandfathers could not in their lifetime. Sharing this second audio clip on Twitter, Annamalai said, “Listen to the DMK ecosystem crumbling from within”. He also thanked PTR for drawing a proper distinction between the DMK and BJP.
It becomes clear, while listening to the 57-second audio multiple times, that it has cuts in the course of the conversation. The first audio was released on April 19, shortly after the DMK files, listing the “ill-gotten” assets of the DMK first family and prominent functionaries. PTR had dismissed it as fake and not authentic.
“It has been repeated and amplified by unscrupulous political players, and I am distressed to find that traditional media, the fourth pillar of democracy, are disseminating such fabricated, malicious, and third-hand information,” he had said in a statement shared on Twitter on Saturday. The Finance Minister also made it clear that he might take appropriate legal measures though in the past he had not resorted to that.
But, the BJP trying to milk political mileage out of this has approached Governor RN Ravi pressing for an independent forensic test. The party has claimed the audio as authentic and so far two delegations of the party have called on Ravi on this issue while the principal opposition AIADMK has said that it would ask the Centre to carry out a probe into this to bring out the truth.
