Tamil Nadu Chief Minister J Jayalalithaa, who abruptly walked out of the NDC meeting in protest after a bell was rung barely minutes after she commenced her speech, has repeated the feat, the venue this time being a Pizza Hut outlet near her Poes Garden residence in Chennai. The AIADMK supremo was seen walking into Pizza Hut, with close friend Sasikala and chief ally, the DMDK supremo, “Captain” Vijayakanth for company. Diners present at the outlet were stunned on seeing the CM casually strolling in, sans security.
“Amma walked in at around 8 pm. We were all stunned. She greeted us all with an elegant ‘namaste’ and sat down with Sasikala madam and Captain. Quite understandably, the rest of us had to wait a bit for our pizzas, as the entire crew, right from servers to cashiers to the outlet manager, assembled near Amma’s table. She told the waiter, ‘I’m bored of eating thayir saadham everyday, paa. Plus, I had a very rough day today. I wanted to cheer myself up. That’s why I came for pizza. I heard that Dominos Pizzas are too cheesy and calorie-high, which won’t do me any good.’ But the waiter insisted that she try Pizza Hut’s all new “Crown” pizza. He said that the pizza was made especially for queens like her and he even placed a crown on her head, much to her amusement. The crew clicked a lot of pictures as well,” recalled Murugesan, one of the diners, to our UnReal correspondent Anbazhagan Selvarasu.
“Then the big incident happened. The manager was just taking down Amma’s order when one of the lucky families who were done with their meal rang the doorbell on their way out, signalling that they had a nice time. Right when Amma was giving her order, the entire crew, out of sheer instinctive habit, looked towards the door and shouted ‘Thank you’, thereby interrupting Amma. This was the last thing which an already enraged Amma wanted and within seconds, she stormed out of the store. As she stood up to go, she gave a glaring stare to Sasikala madam, who followed suit. But a cool Captain continued ordering – ‘Saar, 1 Double Jeez Bebberoni Beezza and one Jeezy Veg Baasdha! Aaungh!‘ - oblivious to the events unfolding around him. That would’ve further enraged her, for sure!” Murugesan added.
“Did the manager not make any attempt to pacify Amma?” asked Selvarasu, to which Murugesan answered, “Ayyo, he tried a lot, paa. She was almost going to come back, when the music system suddenly started playing ‘Jingle Bells, Jingle Bells’. Christmas time, no? So, after this, there was absolutely no stopping her.”
The incident has not gone down well with the opposition, with DMK partriarch M Karunanidhi saying, “What she has done is very wrong. In protest, I will eat pizza at that Pizza Hut outlet every day and I will also ring the bell, before going out!” According to sources, other DMK members too are likely to follow suit.