VK Sasikala aka Sasikala Natarajan and her nephew TTV Dinakaran have been expelled from the All India Anna Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (AIADMK), announced Tamil Nadu minister RB Udayakumar while reading out the party's resolutions taken at a general council meeting on Tuesday, September 12.
Meanwhile, it was also decided that J Jayalalithaa would be named permanent general secretary of the party.
However, the decisions are subject to approval from the Madras High Court, which gave a nod to the meeting yesterday after dismissing a plea from Sasikala loyalists to put it on hold. At least 18 lawmakers loyal to Sasikala skipped the meeting.
Read are the highlights of the meeting here:
- Sources said that the meeting, attended by 2,000 members, officially declared the merger of the factions led by E Palaniswami and O Panneerselvam. This happened following several negotiations. The meeting further ratified Deputy Chief Minister OPS as the chief of the 11-member steering committee of the party.
- Sasikala's expulsion had been one of the key demands by OPS, who had a tiff with Chinnamma after she forced him to give up the chief minister's post earlier this year.
- Sasikala had taken over the reins of the AIADMK after Amma's death in December last year.
- Under the terms of the merger, OPS, who was the chief minister before EPS, had been made the deputy chief minister.
- Meanwhile, Sasikala's nephew Dinakaran seems to have teamed up with the DMK and is demanding a trust vote in the Assembly. He reportedly has the support of 19 lawmakers
- DMK leader MK Stalin reportedly met the governor on Sunday and said he has the support of 119 legislators — including Dinakaran and his men — which is two more than the half of the 234-member Assembly.
- The reunited AIADMK has said it has the majority with 124 seats, counting the nine MLAs who have switched over from Dinakaran's side.
- Dinakaran has said the chief minister should resign, and also threatened that he would "not not hesitate to bring down the EPS government."
- A lawmaker from his camp on Monday filed a petition with the Madras High Court asking the AIADMK General Council meet to be put on standby.
- The court dismissed this petition saying any decision by the AIADMK General Council would be subject to its approval. The next hearing has been scheduled for October 23.
