The AIADMK district secretary meeting on Wednesday, 12 June, sent a clear message to the party functionaries: keep calm and carry on.
Supporters of both Edappadi K Palaniswami and O Panneerselvam have raised the ‘Single Leader’ chorus, and have already put up a number of posters (illegally) in support of their chosen leaders. Is the party heading for a split?
Rajan Chellappa is an AIADMK MLA from Madurai, who also served as the city’s Mayor between 2011 and 2016. In a public meeting attended by other local party-workers and members of other local parties who contested under the twin leaves symbol, he took potshots at the leadership of his own party.
While he did not mention which leader he rooted for, his comments on partiality to a ‘family’ were clearly meant to point fingers at Edappadi Palaniswami, who was an ardent supporter of Sasikala.
While the Narendra Modi government was busy forming the new cabinet, friction between EPS and OPS escalated, over their choices of a candidate for the ministerial berth.
Edappadi Palaniswami was in favour of R Vaithilingam, who is currently a Rajyasabha MP, and who defected back to EPS’ faction from TTV Dhinakaran’s.
Panneerselvam, on the other hand, wanted his son, Raveendranath Kumar to get the ministerial berth. After all, Raveendranath was the only AIADMK MLA to have won a seat in the 2019 elections, having defeated his rival from the Congress EVKS Elangovan.
Anticlimactically, ministerial berths were allotted to any representatives from Tamil Nadu.
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