Chennai: The deposed AIADMK leader and former Chief Minister O. Panneerselvam (OPS) will have to either keep quiet or fight against the now powerful Edappadi K. Palaniswami (EPS) and his team. Sasikala and Dhinakaran too have to rework on their strategies.
After a single bench of the Madras High Court dismissed the injunctions filed by OPS, Manoj Pandian and J.D.S. Prabhakar against the general council meeting of July 11, 2022 and the election of EPS as the general secretary of the party, there are not many options for the OPS camp in the AIADMK.
The only option now left for OPS, who has been expelled by the AIADMK, is to rework his strategy and have a political alliance with expelled former interim general secretary, V.K. Sasikala and her nephew and general secretary of the Amma Makkal Munnetra Kazhagam(AMMK), T.T.V. Dhinakaran.
The powerful Thevar community of South Tamil Nadu to which all the three leaders belong to have been keen that all these leaders remain together in the AIADMK and be a strong force for the opposition unity. During the heydays of the Jayalalithaa regime, the Thevar community was all powerful given the close association that V.K. Sasikala had with the Chief Minister.
The AIADMK politics had taken a turn after the passing away of J. Jayalalithaa and Sasikala was arrested and lodged in the Bengaluru central prison on corruption charges.
OPS and Sasikala fought against each other, and OPS even took up a ‘DharmYudh’ in front of the memorial of Jayalalithaa when rumours of Sasikala becoming the Chief Minister were doing the rounds. Sasikala was arrested in a case related to money laundering and corruption when Jayalalithaa was the Chief Minister.
OPS and EPS, who were not on good terms, later joined together and foisted EPS as the Chief Minster of state. OPS was made the coordinator of AIADMK and EPS the joint coordinator, but differences cropped up between the two leading to EPS taking over the party and in the party general council meeting held on July 11, 2022, OPS was expelled from the AIADMK.
OPS and his associates have filed a petition in the Madras High Court division bench headed by R. Mahadevan against the single bench verdict. Even as the court is to hear the case on Wednesday, OPS, Sasikala, and Dhinakaran are in confabulation to either take over the AIADMK or merge with the AMMK. With AIADMK politics in flux, all eyes are on the next move of the estranged AIADMK leaders, OPS, V.K. Sasikala, and T.T.V Dhinakaran.
–IANS