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A fiery war of words erupted in the Tamil Nadu Assembly as Leader of Opposition Udhayanidhi Stalin and TVK-led government’s ministers traded personal barbs, including a jibe over his alleged three-hour bathroom stay and a swipe at his demand for a government bungalow.

The heated exchange saw Udhayanidhi call Electricity Minister CTR Nirmal Kumar a “Sanghi Minister", while the minister hit back with a reference to an old controversy involving Udhayanidhi’s arrest. Following all this, the Speaker was compelled to order the remarks to be expunged from the Assembly records.

The exchange began when Nirmal Kumar appeared to mistakenly refer to Udhayanidhi as the “honourable Karur MLA" before correcting himself and saying “Coimbatore South MLA".

Udhayanidhi then responded with a sarcastic jab, referring to Nirmal Kumar as the “honourable Sanghi Minister" before correcting himself to “Electricity Minister".

Nirmal Kumar escalated the exchange by referring to the controversy surrounding Udhayanidhi’s arrest, when a senior DMK leader had reportedly said he was in the bathroom to delay his arrest.

“Honourable Minister who spent three hours in the bathroom where one usually spends about 5-10 minutes," Nirmal Kumar said. He threateningly added that even the government could “speak irrelevant" remarks.

Udhayanidhi hit back with another sarcastic remark, asking the Speaker whether a separate department had been created in Tamil Nadu to calculate how much time people spend in the bathroom.

The Speaker intervened and ordered the remarks made during the exchange to be expunged from the Assembly records.

The verbal battle did not end there. Aadhav Arjuna, a senior TVK leader, also took a swipe at Udhayanidhi over a government bungalow, questioning why the Leader of Opposition should be allotted one when he already has three houses.

“Udhayanidhi Stalin has three houses, and he asked for a government bungalow," Arjuna said, questioning whether the government would be right to deny him a bungalow on the grounds that he already owns three houses.

He described the issue as a matter of protocol. The series of personal attacks turned the Assembly proceedings into a tense exchange, with the opposition and treasury benches trading pointed remarks instead of confining the debate to the issue under discussion.

The remarks came amid growing friction between the DMK-led opposition and the government benches, with Udhayanidhi at the centre of several sharp exchanges during the proceedings. The opposition, Dravidra Munnetra Kazhagam (DMK), has been attacking the governing TVK over several issues ranging from — dispute with Karnataka over Cauvery water to Chief Minister Vijay’s meeting with Home Minister Amit Shah.