The memorial meeting held by the DMK to pay homages to its late leader M Karunanidhi at Chennai on Thursday and described as an apolitical conclave turned out to be massive political meeting and ended with leaders of all major Opposition parties reiterating the need to save the country from the forces of communalism and dictatorship while telling the new DMK leadership about the party’s responsibility in saving democracy and secularism.

Farooq Abdullah, leader of the National Conference, who addressed the meeting, charged that India was undergoing a period of dictatorship while the federalism was facing severe threat from the present rulers. “The ruling dispensation at the Centre has bought the entire media and the voice of democracy has been strangulated,” said the National Conference leader while asking the DMK’s new president M K Stalin to carry on with the legacy of late Karunanidhi.

All India Trinamool Congress leader Dereck O’brien said the DMK should win all the 40 seats at stake  from Tamil Nadu in the 2019 lok Sabha election and  play significant role in unseating the present Government at the Centre.

 “Future of India lies in Tamil Nadu and other States. The best tribute to Karunanidhi would be to win all the 40 seats from Tamil Nadu. We are going to win all the 42 seats in Bengal,” said O’brien.

In spite of the DMK President Stalin’s call to his party cadre on Tuesday to devote their energy in getting rid of the “communal” BJP  from the Centre, Union Minister Nitin Gadkari, who addressed the meeting reminded the Dravidian major that it was the Jan Sangh, the precursor to the present day BJP, that stood by the DMK in the days of the 1975 internal emergency declared by the then Prime Minister Indira Gandhi. “Our great leader Atal Behari Vajpayee had attended the Tamil Eelam meeting organised by the DMK at Madurai in 1986. The Jan Sangh leaders were in attendance while the DMK and Karunanidhi held a rally at the Marina Beach in July 1975 against the internal emergency. The Jan Sangh also stood by the DMK when the Karunanidhi-led government was dismissed by the Congress. There are a lot of similarities between the  ideologies of the DMK and the BJP,” said Gadkari.

Nitish Kumar and V Narayanasamy, chief ministers of Bihar and Puducherry respectively, Ghulam Nabi Azad, senior Congress leader , Sitaram Yechury, CPI(M) general secretary, P Sudhakar Reddy, CPI General secretary, Deve Gowda, former Prime Minister, and leaders of TDP also addressed the memorial meeting.

Muslim league leader Khader Moideen demanded the Centre to honour the late Karunanidhi with Bharat Ratna. “He should be also honoured with Nobel Prize and the Centre should take all steps for that,” said Moideen who was supported by Praful Patel,NCP leader.