"Highest of the high respect for Jayalalithaa": Annamalai says all is well with AIADMK

Chennai: Tamil Nadu BJP president K Annamalai on Wednesday said the alliance with AIADMK was continuing and asserted that he had the "highest of the high respect" for that party's late stalwart J Jayalalithaa.

Amid strains in ties between the two parties over Annamalai's purported remarks about Jayalalithaa in a section of media, the BJP leader said his interview to a daily was "misinterpreted" by some of the AIADMK leaders.

"Alliance is there..it is decided at multiple levels," he told a press meet here.

All through he has been against corruption and he will continue to do so.

"I continue to struggle against corruption. I said Tamil Nadu is no.1 in corruption and we have to change it. At the same time, I have spoken at many places about Amma Jayalalithaa. I hold madam Jayalalithaa in the highest of high respect. There are documented videos where I have called her one of the best administrators of Tamil Nadu, in a different context," he told PTI.

He said he had mentioned Tamil Nadu as a corrupt state "because I mean it" and referred to the Income Tax searches at the Secretariat in 2016, when AIADMK was in power and the latest ED raids at the chamber of TN Electricity and Excise and Prohibition Minister V Senthil Balaji (DMK) on Tuesday to buttress his point.

Earlier, at the press meet, responding to a question about any 'misunderstanding' between the two southern allies, especially during Amit Shah's visit here earlier this week, he said the Union Home Minister wanted to share a meal with AIADMK general secretary K Palaniswami.

"I only telephoned him (Palaniswamy). He is under treatment for some leg issue in Salem. Amit Shah wanted to have food with him in Chennai. I am telling these things beacuse there are some speculations--like there was no AIADMK leader in the room (where Shah met celebrities from different fields)," he said.

Annamalai added the particular meeting by Shah was a non-political meeting.

He said Shah had made it clear during his private and public engagements last week that it was the NDA which should get 25 MPs from Tamil Nadu in the 2024 Lok Sabha polls.