Vote against authoritarianism: DMK

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May 13, 2004 15:21 IST

Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam president Muthuvel Karunanidhi described the DPA's victory in Tamil Nadu as a 'vote against the dictatorial policies' of the central and state governments.

"The results are along expected lines," Karunanidhi said, even as it became clear that the Democratic Progressive Alliance would sweep the state.

Thanking the people for the massive mandate to the DPA, he said poll trends elsewhere in the country only echoed
the sentiments of the people of Tamil Nadu.

Karunanidhi said the DMK would continue to voice the interests of the people of the state in Parliament.

Even as jubilant DMK workers celebrated the victory, Tamil Nadu BJP president C P Radhakrishnan attributed the reverse in the fortunes of the BJP-AIADMK combine in the state to the mood of the people, 'who want and prefer a change.'

"People may be thinking of a change and as a result, an anti-government wave is sweeping across the state," he told
reporters at the counting center for the Coimbatore Lok Sabha constituency.

"We accept defeat," Radhakrishnan, the party candidate from the constituency, said. "We fought the polls
on the plank of uplinking national rivers from the Ganges to Cauvery, while DMK chief, M Karunanidhi fought for tap water."

On whether the NDA would again tap the doors of the DMK to form a government at the Centre the BJP leader, who was hoping for a hat trick of wins from the constituency, said, "That is not my job, it is someone else's job."

"At present, we are in alliance with a party - win or lose, we will stay with it," Radhakrishnan said, leaving the counting station midway through the process once it became clear the trend was in favor of his rival, CPI candidate K Subbarayan.

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