Chennai:
The main opposition party DMK skipped the diamond jubilee celebrations of the Tamil Nadu assembly organised by the state government in Chennai today.
The celebrations were held at the historic Fort St George, where President Pranab Mukherjee was invited as the chief guest. Speaking on the occasion, he focused on the disruptions in the Parliament and called for a "collective thinking to avoid this".
The legislative assembly, formerly known as Madras Legislative Assembly, was constituted as early as 1919 and it came under the Centre in 1935.
In her address Chief Minister Jayalalithaa recollected the evolution of the state assembly from the days of the Madras Presidency. The occasion also brought to the house three veterans who were members of the very first assembly.
DMK had announced its decision to skip the function on Thursday. DMK chief M Karunanidhi had said, "The celebration is organised without respecting others; there is no respect for the DMK and hence the party will not attend the function".
During his tenure, former Chief Minister Karunanidhi had constructed a new assembly complex spending more than thousand crore rupees. But Chief Minister Jayalalithaa had decided to scrap the project and announced that it would be converted into a multi-specialty hospital. A legal battle is currently underway in the Madras High Court over this issue.