Chennai, May 13: The four-day-old TVK government in Tamil Nadu crossed a major political hurdle on Wednesday, with Chief Minister C Joseph Vijay comfortably winning the trust vote in the state assembly by 144 votes in favour and 22 against amid a DMK walkout and a divided AIADMK, whose 25 rebel MLAs backed the actor-politician.
The floor test, which solidified Vijay’s position as the chief minister, also exposed a full-blown split in the AIADMK, as 22 MLAs supporting party chief Edappadi K Palaniswami voted against the government, while the C Ve Shanmugam-SP Velumani faction voted in favour of the TVK.
As opposition leaders, including Palaniswami and DMDK legislator Premalatha Vijayakanth, accused TVK of horse-trading, the chief minister countered with a punchline that became the highlight of his speech.
“This government runs at horse-speed, not through horse-trading,” Vijay asserted.
The chief minister also alleged that the people rejected the DMK, and therefore, the DMK might wish to insult TVK.
Replying to discussions over the vote of confidence resolution moved by him, Vijay also said his government will always be secular and will continue to implement the welfare schemes launched by previous regimes.
“All religions are our religions. All people are our people. There will be no discrimination between those who voted for us and those who did not. This is a government for everyone. This is a government for the common people,” he said.
While the main opposition DMK, with 59 MLAs in the 234-member House, staged a walkout slamming the government, the PMK with 4 MLAs and the lone BJP member abstained.
The Vijay-led TVK government comfortably crossed the 118 majority mark, drawing support from the Congress, VCK, Left, IUML and MLA S Kamaraj, who was expelled from AMMK for supporting Vijay.
Minutes before Velumani announced support, Palaniswami asked his party MLAs to vote against the government. The Velumani-Shanmugam-led group defied the diktat and sided with the TVK regime. Noisy scenes were witnessed as Palaniswami’s faction opposed Velumani-Shanmugam group’s announcement of support to the government.
At the time of voting, TVK –which won 108 seats– had a strength of 105 MLAs. While the court barred one TVK MLA from voting, the total number further decreased because Vijay had also resigned from Tiruchi-East. Speaker JCD Prabhakar cannot vote unless there is a “tie” situation.
Wednesday’s win provided the maiden TVK government the much-needed confidence to settle down amid questions about its stability following the lack of a majority. Another floor test cannot be held for the next six months.
As soon as the House convened at 9.30 am, CM Vijay, attired in a black blazer, moved the vote of confidence resolution, and the legislators belonging to all parties spoke on the motion.
The “count and assess” method of division-wise voting, which involves calling out each MLA’s name to ascertain their stand, was used.
After conducting the voting exercise, Speaker JCD Prabhakar declared that the resolution moved by the chief minister seeking the Assembly’s vote of confidence had won with 144 MLAs voting in favour and 22 against it. Five MLAs took a neutral stand.
Speaking on the trust vote, Leader of Opposition Udhayanidhi Stalin said, “a majority of people did not vote for TVK.”
Only 1.72 crore people voted for the Vijay-led party, and the remaining 3.21 crore people voted “against your party,” he said.
The DMK leader claimed that about 65 per cent of the people rejected the TVK,and the confidence in the government is reducing gradually, including those who had voted for the actor-politician-led party.
He said the TVK does not have numbers, and it has cobbled up support by bringing together parties that fought polls under the DMK-led alliance and opposed the TVK.
Pointing to support from Kamaraj, Udhayanidhi said AMMK leader TTV Dhinakaran had alleged horse-trading earlier. Kamaraj was part of AMMK, which was a constituent of the NDA, the ideological foe of TVK. (PTI)
