No political colour to Modi-Karuna meeting: Stalin, Sitharaman

Two days after Prime Minister Narendra Modi called on ailing DMK patriarch M Karunanidhi, senior leaders from the BJP and the regional party said today nothing political should be read into it, dismissing talk of a possible realignment.
Defence Minister Nirmala Sitharaman and DMK working president M K Stalin separately dismissed speculations about the possibility of a political alliance between the two parties that were once coalition partners.
"It is a good political culture, Kalaignar (Karunanidhi) is a senior political leader and despite idological differences the prime minister met him," Sitharaman told reporters at the BJP's Tamil Nadu headquarters here.

The BJP leader was responding to a question about whether the meeting could be a precursor to an alliance between the two parties.
Sitharaman said it was the good culture in the country to visit elderly people who were ill, indicating there was nothing political about the meeting.
Stalin, addressing at a protest in Madurai against demonetisation on its first anniversary, said no politics was involved in Modi meeting Karunandihi.

The prime minister, in the city for a day on Monday to attend various programmes, paid an unscheduled visit to the 93-year old Karunanidhi, setting off the buzz about a political realignment at a time when the Palaniswami- Panneerselvam camp of the ruling AIADMK was said to be cosying up to the BJP.

"Modi did not come for politics, we are also not ready to use him anytime for politics," Stalin, Karunanidhi's son, said.
Stalin, the Leader of the Opposition in the state Assembly, said he had clarified on Monday itself that Modi met Karunanidhi as the DMK president was a senior Dravidian leader and that he was taking rest in view of his old age.
He also said Modi invited Karunanidhi, who was hospitalised twice in December last year for problems including lung infection, to stay at his Delhi residence.
"He (Modi) said they won't allow you (Karunanidhi) to take rest here as there would be a stream of visitors. He also invited (Karunanidhi) to come to his Delhi residence for treatment," Stalin said, adding "therefore this is humanitarian, and beyond politics."

On actor Kamal Haasan's remark that Modi should admit demonemtisation was a "mistake," Sitharaman said he will know the complete picture of what the exercise was about only when he spoke to all kinds of economists and "not some select ecnomists."
Replying to a question about Haasan entering politics, she said everybody has the right to join politics in a democracy.