AIADMK’s lone Lok Sabha MP O P Ravindranath, also the son of O Panneerselvam, and five district secretaries are among 18 party functionaries who were expelled from their primary memberships on Thursday by interim general secretary Edappadi K Palaniswami for indulging in “anti-party activities.”
V P Jayapradeep, Panneerselvam’s younger son, Syed Khan, a close aide of O Panneerselvam and secretary of Theni district AIADMK, former minister Vellamandi N Natarajan, and R T Ramachandran, Perambalur district secretary, are some of the prominent members who were expelled from the party.
All the 18 leaders were active supporters of Panneerselvam, who was expelled from the AIADMK on July 11. “These people are being removed from their primary memberships of the AIADMK for acting in contradiction with the goals and policies of the party. They also brought disrepute to the AIADMK,” a statement released by Palaniswami said.
He also instructed that party cadres should not be in touch with the expelled functionaries. The expelled functionaries also include Marudhu Azhaguraj, former editor of Namadhu MGR, AIADMK’s mouthpiece.
The action by Edappadi K Palaniswami expelling O Panneerselvam’s sons and supporters from the party was expected as the general council on July 11 sacked O Panneerselvam and three of his die-hard supporters – R Vaithilingam, J C D Prabhakar, and P H Manoj Pandian.
However, O Panneerselvam maintains Edappadi K Palaniswami has no power to sack him from the party as he is still the coordinator in the records of the Election Commission of India (ECI). Edappadi K Palaniswami’s action also came a day after he made key appointments by naming two deputy general secretaries – one from the Vanniyar community and another from Mukulathors, the caste to which O Panneerselvam and Sasikala belong.
In the new appointments, Edappadi K Palaniswami has kept caste calculations in mind by inducting four Mukulathors, two Vanniyars, and two from Scheduled Caste (SC) as organising secretaries of the AIADMK. The party will remove O Panneerselvam as the deputy floor in the assembly on Sunday during a meeting of the Legislature Party. The meeting will elect a new deputy leader.