Saturday, March 4 2006 20:25 Hrs (IST) - World Time -

Tiruchirappali: DMK, a key ally of the ruling UPA at the Centre, today (Mar 04 2006) demanded a Constitutional amendment to provide for a "wholesome and genuine federalism" for protecting national unity and integrity.

In order to protect the national unity and integrity and the basic concepts of unity in diversity, there was an urgent need for amending the Constitution, recognising the divergent cultural and linguistic culture of the nation, a resolution passed at the 9th state-level party conference here said.

This was the only way to provide the states autonomy, it said and asked the Centre to take all steps for this.

Charging the AIADMK Government of being "sadist," it appealed to the electorate to vote for the DMK-led DPA in the May 8 elections and ensure victory of the alliance.

The government had denied the "fundamental right" of the workers by introducing ESMA and TESMA and denied legitimate wage hike and bonus, the resolution said referring to the government employees strike in 2004.

Another resolution condemned the state Government for "foisting" cases against political opponents and said "no case had stood the legal scrutiny so far".

Yet another resolution charged the AIADMK Government with allowing the ruling partymen to "swindle" the tsunami and flood relief funds sanctioned by the Centre.