The DMK government has distributed 1,01,623 acres of land free of cost to the landless farm workers under the free land distribution scheme, as promised in the DMK election manifesto, Chief Minister and DMK President M Karunanidhi said today.

Reacting to AIADMK General Secretary J Jayalalithaa's poser during her electioneering in the Madurai West constituency about the scheme and disputing a report in a weekly that the scheme was not properly implemented, Mr Karunanidhi said like other poll promises, the promise of distributing free lands was also being implemented in the right spirit.

He said after the scheme was launched on September 19, last year, coinciding with the birth anniversary of rationalist leader Periyar E V Ramasamy, he had inaugurated the fourth phase of the scheme at Tirunelveli on June 17.

So far, the DMK government had distributed 1,01,623 acres of land to 91,576 landless farm workers, who included 24,774 beneficiaries belonging to scheduled caste, 2089 scheduled tribes, 32,048 backward classes and 3,785 others, he said.

When this was the fact, it was surprising that Ms Jayalalithaa and some media supporting her were trying to find fault with the scheme, he said, and detailed the number of house site pattas given by the DMK government, eversince it came to power in 1967.

Mr Karunanidhi also took exception to the weekly report that the government had distributed some temple lands under the scheme. The weekly's report, even after a denial by Minister Ko Si Mani, amounted to casting aspersions, he said.