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Journalism of Courage
SMARTING FROM the defeat of its official candidate in the R K Nagar byelection to T T V Dinakaran, the AIADMK’s ruling faction convened an emergency review meeting on Monday and expelled several senior party leaders seen as being close to Dinakaran, who himself had earlier been thrown out of the party.
Chief Minister Edappadi K Palaniswami and Deputy CM O Panneerselvam were among the leaders who attended the meeting, in which the ruling party refused to accept the defeat of party candidate E Madhusudhanan. Palaniswami accused Dinakaran of bribing voters and urged the Election Commission to probe reports on this.
The leaders who stand expelled are AIADMK district secretaries of south Chennai (north) V P Kalairajan, north Chennai (north) P Vetrivel, Vellore (east) N G Parthibhan, Thanjavur (north) M Rangaswamy, and Thanga Tamilselvan of Theni, Popular V Muthiah of Tirunelveli (urban) area, the party’s Karnataka state secretary V Pugazhendhi, AIADMK’s propaganda leader Nanjil K Sampath, and women’s wing deputy secretary C R Saraswathi.
The action left many within the party surprised, as most of these leaders have been known supporters of Dinakaran for months now.
“Today’s action was necessitated by the defeat (in the R K Nagar byelection), and we picked the most obvious violators,” a senior AIADMK leader said.
Calling the expulsion decision equal to “killing a dead body again”, a senior minister in the Palaniswami cabinet said the rapid developments over the last couple of days has put the government in an unpredictable position.
The minister said, “Besides 19 MLAs (disqualified) supporting Dinakaran, more than 20 MLAs spoke to him over phone after the bypoll result on Sunday. A senior minister even suggested a compromise between the two factions, although some top leaders including Palaniswami, may refuse to budge.”
According to this minister, there are the two possibilities: “Either a compromise between the factions or a fall of the Palaniswami government.”
DMK panel to look into defeat
Chennai: A day after DMK candidate in the RK Nagar bypoll finished an embarrassing third, even losing his deposit, the party’s working president M K Stalin formed a three-member inquiry committee on Monday evening to probe the reasons behind the defeat. The panel comprises the DMK Whip in the Assembly, R Sakrapani, the party’s legal wing secretary, R Girirajan, and assistant secretary Ve Kannadasan, according to a statement. The committee has reportedly been directed to submit the report before December 31. ENS/PTI
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