Lok Sabha elections 2024: Prime Minister Narendra Modi attacks Congress, DMK over Katchatheevu, 'Shakti' remarks

Vellore, Tamil Nadu: Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Wednesday launched a scathing attack on Congress and its ally, the ruling DMK in Tamil Nadu, on Katchatheevu and 'Shakti' remarks, accusing them of keeping the 'country in the dark' over the former and charged them with ill-treatment of women.

He especially singled out the DMK over alleged corruption, saying the Dravidian party had the 'first copyright' on the issue and added the 'family' was intent on looting the state, in an apparent reference to the party's first family, headed by its president and Chief Minister M K Stalin.

"The DMK has the first copyright on corruption, the entire family is looting Tamil Nadu," he said at an election rally here, while canvassing votes for NDA candidates, including BJP nominees for the April 19 Lok Sabha elections in the state.

He further charged the DMK with being "a family company," that was impeding the progress of the state's youth with its "old mindset."

"DMK divides people over language, region, faith and caste. DMK knows that the day people see through this, it will not get a single vote. I have decided to expose the decades-old dangerous politics of DMK," Modi, whose BJP is making a spirited fight to make significant electoral inroads in the Dravidian heartland, said.

Once again targeting the Congress and DMK, both of whom were at power in the Centre and the state, respectively, in 1974 when Katchatheevu islet was ceded to Sri Lanka, he asked in which cabinet meeting was such a decision arrived upon and to 'benefit' whom. The Congress had not provided answers to these.

Post its ceding, Indian fishermen from Tamil Nadu were arrested and their boats seized and the 'Congress and the DMK show fake compassion,' to them, he alleged.

However, the NDA government was ensuring their 'permanent release,' even as he saved five fishermen from the gallows in Sri Lanka, Modi said.

Attacking the Congress over its "prince Rahul Gandhi's' Shakti remarks, Modi claimed the former talked of 'destroying Shakti of Hindu faith." "That is the mentality of DMK as well. They speak ill of Sanatana Dharma, boycott Ram temple inauguration (in Ayodhya)," besides the installation of the 'sacred Sengol,' in the new Parliament building, he added.

The I.N.D.I. alliance people 'ill-treat' women and everybody knows how the DMK treated the late 'Amma Jayalalithaa,' when she was alive.

"Your blessings for the BJP and the NDA will protect Sanatan Shakti and ensure women's honour," the PM said.