Chennai, Jul 20 (IANS): AIADMK's Joint Coordinator and former Tamil Nadu Chief Minister K. Palaniswami on Monday claimed that the state's people feel cheated by the ruling DMK over the NEET issue.

He said that the DMK had openly said that it would not conduct the examination if it came to power, but its government has yet to clarify whether it would conduct NEET or not.

In a statement, he said that even after he had repeatedly asked both the Chief Minister and the Health Minister whether NEET exams would be held or not, there was no reply from either of the leaders.

Palaniswami also said that his government had got the Cauvery waters for Tamil Nadu after a prolonged legal battle in the Supreme Court. "The Supreme Court had ruled that at no place, Cauvery water should be stopped, stored or diverted."

He said that the Karnataka government was deliberately trying to stop Cauvery water from coming to Tamil Nadu by announcing that a dam would be constructed at Mekedatu over the Cauvery river, and termed this "highly condemnable".

He claimed that if a dam is constructed over Cauvery at Mekedatu, the whole delta region would turn into a desert, and it would also lead to total drinking water scarcity at 16 districts.

On the charge of vaccine wastage, Palaniswami said that during the initial phases of vaccination, the people feared taking vaccines and that the charges of vaccines being deliberately wasted during the AIADMK period does not stand. He said that wastage had occurred due to the low turnaround of people and accused the DMK of being instrumental in conducting campaigns across the state against vaccination.

He also said that he had urged the Prime Minister to provide maximum doses of vaccines to Tamil Nadu and that the state government should take this up.

He also said that the AIADMK was ready to face the local body polls whenever they were held and hit out at former interim General Secretary V.K. Sasikala for "deliberately spreading lies" regarding the party's defeat in the 2021 Assembly elections.