Tamil Nadu's ruling AIADMK on Wednesday, October 7 announced that Chief Minister Edappadi K Palaniswami will be the party's chief ministerial candidate for the 2021 Assembly polls. The much-expected announcement was made by party Deputy Chief Minister O Panneerselvam at the party headquarters.
The major announcement comes amid the faction war between the two camps in AIADMK led by Palaniswami and Paneerselvam. OPS has been engaged in a standoff with EPS over the 11-member panel as well who will be the CM face for AIADMK with no Jayalalithaa at the helm.
Accepting the demand of Panneerselvam, the party has also announced the setting up of an 11-member steering committee to guide the party. The formation of the steering committee was announced by party Joint Coordinator and Chief Minister Palaniswami.
The members of the steering committee are: Dindigul C. Sreenivasan, S.P. Velumani, P. Thangamani, C.Ve.Shanmugam, D. Jayakumar, R.Kamaraj, Manoj Pandian, J.C.D. Prabhakar, P. Mohan, Gopalakrishnan and Manickam.
10 facts about EPS, the new CM candidate for Tamil Nadu 2021 Elections
- The senior All India Anna Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (AIADMK) leader was born March 2, 1954,
- He was born in a farmer family from the dominant Gounder caste at Edapadi in Salem district of Tamil Nadu.
- Palaniswamy was a loyalist of former Tamil Nadu chief minister late J Jayalalithaa since the 1980s when AIADMK was split into two factions.
- He had also bagged the assembly elections four times contesting from Edapadi constituency in 1989,1991, 2011 and 2016.
- Edappadi K. Palaniswami was selected by the AIADMK as Chief Minister of Tamil Nadu in February 2017, following the resignation of O. Panneerselvam, who became chief minister after the demise of former chief minister J. Jayalalithaa.
- He was appointed by Sasikala after she was convicted in the Disproportionate Assets Case by the SC.
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Sasikala was sentenced to four years in jail in a disproportionate asset (DA) case. Before leaving for the Central Jail in Bengaluru, she named EPS as her successor.
- Before assuming office as the Chief Minister of Tamil Nadu in 2017, he served as the Minister for Highways & Minor Ports in the Jayalalithaa and O. Panneerselvam-led ministries of the Tamil Nadu Government.
- During his reign, he introduced various schemes like Kudimaramaththu Work, FAME India scheme and Amma Patrol was introduced in Tamil Nadu to ascertain the security of women and children in public places.
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