Chennai

One such occurrence took place on Day 1 of the current session. Speaker P Dhanapal — who was in the Assembly chair — addressed the RK Nagar MLA TTV Dhinakaran on more than one occasion by calling him ‘honourable’. 

Though by norm, all members of the House should be addressed ‘honourable’, it hardly gets adhered to during the course of the session. The reference became conspicuous as there were two other members who didn’t get the same address even as they were also part of the trio that sought the attention of Chief Minister Edappadi K Palaniswami to the incidents that happened on May 22, 2018 during the agitation seeking closure of Sterlite Plant in Thoothukudi district. 

The other two members SP Shunmuganathan, a ruling party legislator and former minister, and M Thamimun Ansari, an AIADMK ally who contested in TwoLeaves symbol were merely addressed by their names but TTV got an ‘honourable’ prefix. 

While the DMK legislators, referring to the address, were prodding ruling party legislators, it is anybody’s guess if the Speaker was trying to imitate Mark Anthony from Shakespeare’s Julius Ceaser by addressing his sworn enemy as an ‘honourable’ man.                                             

—R Prince Jebakumar, Chennai

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