Katchatheevu: CM joins issue with Jaya

Chennai, Sep 25 (UNI) Tamil Nadu Chief Minister M Karunanidhi today joined issue with his bete noire and AIADMK Supremo J Jayalalithaa on the Katchatheevu issue and said the DMK had opposed it when the island was handed over to Sri Lanka.

Referring to Ms Jayalalithaa's charge he raised the issue with an eye on the ensuing local body polls, Mr Karunanidhi said only because of the DMK's opposition, the fishing rights in the area and drying of nets were included in the agreement.

Later, they were removed from the agreement when the state was under the Governor's rule, he pointed out.

''If I did not write to Prime Minister on the issue, she will say that even after three months of coming to power, I did not talk about the issue. If I write a letter, she is saying it is done with an eye on the polls,'' Mr Karunanidhi said and recalled her remarks in 1991 that she would retrieve the Katchatheevu.

On her claim that more than 200 people had died of Chikungunya, Mr Karunanidhi said most of the people she had referred had actually died in accidents.

She had concealed the real facts, he claimed and recalled Union Health Minister Anbumani Ramadoss's statement that Chikungunya was not a fatal disease and the state government had tackled the spread of the disease.

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