PM Modi sounded positive on CMB, claims Thambidurai

Speaking at the airport, Thambidurai said, “The Chief Minister had given a letter to the Prime Minister at the airport requesting him to form the CMB. The Prime Minister had assured to consider the demand. There are five more weeks to form the Cauvery Management Board as per the Supreme Court order. Let us hope good things will happen soon,” he said.

When asked if the state government had obtained the dates for an all-party delegation to meet the Prime Minister in Delhi to press for the formation of the Cauvery Management Board and Cauvery Water Regulation Committee, the senior AIADMK leader said the Chief Minister is taking steps to obtain an appointment with the Prime Minister and fix the timing. The Chief Minister would decide on the matter and take the move forward, Thambidurai added. 

The Lok Sabha Deputy Speaker evaded a direct reply to a query if the MPs belonging to Tamil Nadu would raise the issue in Parliament by merely stating Jayalalithaa dreamt of setting up of the board and now it had come true. Recalling the former chief minister’s speech in Thanjavur that gazetting the Cauvery Water Disputes Tribunal’s final award which ordered establishing the Cauvery Management Board was a major achievement in her life, Thambidurai said the Prime Minister would come out with a positive decision to the request made on her birth anniversary. Thambidurai denied allegations of complacency in the making up of the bronze statue installed at the AIADMK headquarters and said such mistakes happen and it could not be termed as complacency. Fisheries Minister D Jayakumar had already announced that the statue would undergo corrections and the mistakes would be rectified. 

In Puducherry, Modi attacked only the Congress and not the other regional parties, he said and added that the state government has a good relationship with the Centre. The AIADMK is like a banyan tree and it would survive for another hundred years, he asserted. He declined to comment on Deputy Chief Minister O Panneerselvam’s remarks that the latter merged with the ruling AIADMK faction following the advice of Modi.