Tamil Nadu Governor Ravi skips customary Assembly address, hits out at Speaker M Appavu

Hours after the drama unfolded in the Assembly, Governor Ravi hit back at Speaker M Appavu. In a release, Raj Bhavan said the Governor’s draft address was received on February 9 and it had “numerous passages with misleading far from truth”.

The release said Governor Ravi had returned the file and advised the government to show due respect to the national anthem and play it at the beginning and end of his address. He had also written about it in the past to Chief Minister Stalin as well as the Speaker, however, the government chose to ignore the advice.

“Governor’s address should reflect Government’s achievements, policies and programmes and to inform the House of the cause of its summons and should not be a forum for peddling misleading statements and venting blatantly partisan political views,” the statement read.

Earlier in the day, Governor Ravi said, “This address has numerous passages with which I convincingly disagree on factual and moral grounds. Me lending my voice to them could constitute a constitutional travesty, hence with respect to the House, I conclude my address. Wish this House a productive and healthy discussion for the good of the people. Vaazhga Tamil Nadu, Vaazhaga Bharatam, Jai Hind, Jai Bharat, Nandri”.

Following this, Assembly Speaker Appavu read out the prepared Tamil version of the address which highlighted the economic growth and societal progress of the Stalin-led government and how it has managed to do that despite the onslaught of multiple disasters over the years.

While addressing the Assembly in the presence of Ravi, Appavu said the Governor spoke his mind. He added the Centre hasn’t released flood relief funds to the state and he can ask the Governor to recommend to the Union Government to release Rs 50,000 crore from the PM Cares Fund for flood relief.

After Appavu spoke about the alleged delay by the Union Government in releasing the flood relief fund, Ravi walked out of the Assembly.

In the release, the Raj Bhavan said when the Speaker concluded his address, the Governor rose for the national anthem as scheduled. However, instead of following the schedule, the Speaker launched a tirade against Ravi and called him a follower of Nathuram Godse and more, it added.

“The Hon’ble Speaker with his unbecoming conduct lowered the dignity of his chair and (the) grace of the House,” the statement read.

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