Stalin Recounts Emergency Jail Torture After Vijay's Jaw Gesture

The political confrontation in Tamil Nadu has sharpened after Chief Minister C Joseph Vijay's gesture of holding his jaw during an Assembly speech, which the opposition DMK read as a jibe at party president M K Stalin. Two days on, Stalin responded by recounting his experience of imprisonment during the Emergency, stating that his jaw was broken in custody.

Stalin, then in his early twenties and a youth wing leader of the DMK, was arrested in early 1976, shortly after the Karunanidhi-led government was dismissed during the Emergency of 1975-77. He recalled that prisoners were subjected to several forms of cruelty, that ten of them were locked in a small room with a single urinal, and that they had to sleep amid the stench.

Describing the treatment meted out, he said the police would not let them sleep at night and beat them with lathis and boots, and that life convicts were deployed to assault them. Chitti Babu, a Member of Parliament who was with him, died in jail, Stalin said, adding that his own jaw bones were broken in that assault.

Calling the Chief Minister's gesture inappropriate, Stalin said he still carries the scars of the blows he received. He noted that many in public life, particularly those who had struggled for Tamils and Tamil Nadu, had faced such clampdowns, and that enduring struggle and its consequences was nothing new to them.

He urged Vijay to read the history of Tamil Nadu and the DMK, invoking Annadurai, whom the Chief Minister has described as an inspiration, and said he was proud to be part of that legacy. "Read about my life, my struggle. You don't know the truth," Stalin said.

During his September 7 speech, in which he targeted the DMK over alleged corruption, Vijay was seen holding his jaw with one hand as if to lift it. As the DMK intensified its criticism, Vijay clarified that his body language, including the gesture, was involuntary and entirely unintentional. In a social media statement, he said it was an accidental expression and asked that it not be interpreted as an act meant to hurt anyone's feelings on a personal level.

DMK leaders maintained that Vijay was mocking Stalin, a reference that carries painful history for the former chief minister. In his autobiography, Ungalil Oruvan (One Among You), Stalin describes his 1976 arrest and subsequent imprisonment, and refers to the prison being turned into a torture chamber echoing with cries of pain and death.

The episode has also placed Vijay at odds with his ally, the CPM. The party's state secretary, P Shanmugam, condemned the Chief Minister's gesture, saying Stalin had been severely beaten by the police during the Emergency and that his jaw was broken.