Makkal Needhi Maiam (MNM) Secretary-General A Arunachalam Friday joined the BJP in the presence of Union Minister Prakash Javedkar in a setback for Kamal Haasan in the run-up to the Tamil Nadu Assembly polls. Arunachalam, one of the founder members of the MNM, said he had taken the decision after Haasan refused to endorse the Farm Laws of the Centre.
Arunachalam said he was blessed to join the saffron party on the anniversary of the birth of former Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee.
“Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Home Minister Amit Shah have introduced these three agricultural rules. I know the rewards of being from the farming culture. When I urged my leader and the high command group to support the decision of the Middle, they declined,” Arunachalam said.
“On many occasions, I advised them not to recognise the legislation as a BJP initiative, but as something that the Center had come up with for the welfare of farmers. I told them they were a centrist party, that if they don’t accept the government’s decision, there won’t be any distinction between them and the opposition. Yet they continued to resist the ruling,” he said. Arunachalan said he could “no longer exist in a party which acts against the welfare of the farmers.”
