The Tamil Nadu BJP President, Nainar Nagendran, met with Governor Rajendra Vishwanath Arlekar on Saturday to submit a memorandum calling for legal action over the alleged participation of two private individuals in a recent state cabinet meeting, branding the incident a breach of the oath of secrecy. Speaking after the meeting at Raj Bhavan in Chennai, Nagendran confirmed that he, accompanied by BJP Tamil Nadu state in-charge Arvind Menon and state spokesperson Narayanan Thirupathy, had pressed the Governor to intervene. He explained that their petition urged the Governor to act on the alleged behaviour of Higher Education Minister Viswanathan towards children, alongside the controversial presence of John Arokiyasamy and Vishnu Reddy at the cabinet meeting. The delegation also requested that the Governor advise Chief Minister Joseph Vijay to ensure such incidents are not repeated.
In addition to these governance concerns, the BJP leadership raised alarms over a deteriorating law and order situation in Tamil Nadu, accusing the administration of failing to tackle serious crime. Nagendran claimed that since the current government took office, the state had recorded 151 rapes, 85 murders, and more than 80 drug trafficking incidents, layout out a failure on the part of the Chief Minister to take decisive action. While acknowledging that no government can resolve every problem overnight, he alleged that members of the ruling party itself were implicated in various offences, including crimes against women, yet had faced no consequences. He also criticised the failure of the administration in specifying their plan against crime, pointing out that even though they have issued white papers on a variety of topics, they have not given any report regarding these criminal matters.
The BJP leader then pointed out the problems with other ministers as well, such as those relating to Minister Sarathkumar and corruption by Minister Nirmal Kumar in regard to the posting of government advocates. Nagendran believed that bribes in the form of 5 lakhs to 50 lakhs of rupees were being demanded for the advocates' jobs, despite the knowledge of the law possessed by the minister.
Lastly, Nagendran justified the acts of Governor Arlekar, denying all allegations about the recent state visits of the Governor and stressing the point that the Governor is authorised enough to check the implementation of the schemes initiated by the central government and evaluate the public programmes. He also denied any politicisation of the post of the Governor, expressing appreciation for his cooperation in different state programmes and criticising those insulting statements that have been made by the ministers. In reference to rumours about secret financial assistance of the BJP to the TVK party, Nagendran refuted the allegation, wondering how could his party be filing grievances against the administration in case they support them.
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