Swamy threatens to launch stir on Madurai airport naming issue

Janata Party leader Subramanian Swamy has threatened to launch an agitation if the Tamil Nadu Government further delayed its consent to name the city airport after freedom fighter Pasumpon Muthuramalinga Thevar.

Addressing a well-attended meeting organised by his party here this evening, Swamy, a former Lok Sabha member from this city, said the civil aviation ministry had already forwarded to the state government his proposal to name the airport after Thevar, revered by the backward Thevar community, seeking its comments.

Besides he had himself written a letter regarding the same. "But the Tamil Nadu Government is sitting silent on the letter," he claimed. He also said AIADMK Government headed by O Panneerselvam in 2001 had also not given its consent for the proposal.

"We follow the same policy of Thevar -- that nationalism and spiritualism are two eyes of a man. Thevar had national
outlook,and broke the back of the British in Tamil Nadu when the so called Dravidian parties were backing the Raj. Now it is for the congress Government to decide whether to name the airport after a freedom fighter or not, " he said.