Chennai: The principal opposition party in Tamil Nadu, the DMK, hit out strongly against the Narendra Modi government for its ‘selective fight against corrupt’ questioning its ‘silence’ when all the AIADMK MLAs were held prisoners inside Kuvathur resort outside Chennai.

There were reports of large scale money transfer and horse trading when Sasikala faction confined its MLAs till the confidence vote was over in the assembly. Couple of MLAs who escaped the ‘prison’ had made allegations that they were kept inside against their wishes and that there was money also paid to the MLAs for voting for Sasikala’s candidate E Palanisami during the confidence vote.

“At that time no raids of IT or even state police could take place at Kuvathur,” said a senior DMK leader questioning the role of the central government that seemed to side with the AIADMK. “Are there no corruption charges against AIADMK leaders”,” he questioned.

DMK working president took serious note of the IT raids on Congress minister in Karnataka and said this was a direct threatening message to the Gujarat MLAs who were flown and kept safe and away from poaching BJP leaders on the prowl.

“Why the I-T department didn’t conduct such raids on the Koovathur resort near Chennai where more than 100 AIADMK legislators were made to stay in February,” Stalin questioned.

In a hard hitting statement, Stalin said the IT department could have visited Kuvathur and conducted a search when the AIADMK legislators were lodged there and given huge sums of money and gold. “There were reports of horse-trading and rates being fixed for MLAs. But the I-T department had remained silent then,” Stalin said.

It is a case of double standards of the BJP and the NDA government when it came to the issue of corruption. “The BJP appeared to be tolerant of corruption as there were reports of the AIADMK joining the NDA government,” Stalin said.