Though the opposition leader in the State Assembly and DMK president MK Stalin also welcomed the Supreme Court's ruling on Friday on holding the elections to rural local bodies in Tamil Nadu, barring the nine new districts formed from recent bifurcations, he lauded it for a different reason.

Mr. Stalin, speaking to reporters here, chose to emphasise that the Supreme Court ruling cancelling the existing notification by the State Election Commission (SEC) and putting off the polls in the new nine districts until delimitation of wards was done properly, were a “vindication” of the DMK's prayer in the Apex court.




The Apex court has directed that delimitation in the new nine districts should be carried out properly and also reservation provided for ST and women categories and only then could the SEC order elections in those dis-tricts.

“This is what we have also been emphasising in our prayer and hence the judgment is historic, the word used by the Chief Minister Edappadi K Palaniswami himself,” Stalin said.

It was for the same demands that “we moved the court in 2016 also,” he affir-med.

Once again rejecting the ruling party's “false propaganda” that the DMK was stalling the elections, Mr. Stalin said the DMK was ready to fight the panchayat elections, adding “we, along with our allies will secure a very big victory.”

Meanwhile, DMK general secretary Prof K Anbazhagan has also convened a meeting of the party's district secretaries, MPs' and MLAs' in Chennai on December 8 to discuss the party's approach and strategies including seat-sharing for the local bodies elections.