After giving him a long rope, the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) seems to have finally dumped its once blue-eyed-boy, O Panneerselvam, by recognizing his political rival Edappadi K Palaniswami as the leader of the AIADMK, which heads the alliance in Tamil Nadu.
The BJP has officially invited Palaniswami for a meeting of the National Democratic Alliance (NDA) in New Delhi on July 18 along with leaders from the Paatali Makkal Katchi (PMK) and Tamil Maanila Congress (TMC), leaving Panneerselvam, who was expelled from the AIADMK last year, in the lurch.
“OPS will not be invited to the NDA meeting on July 18. We cannot consider him as part of the AIADMK as the Supreme Court and Election Commission of India (ECI) have not just recognized EPS as the leader of the party but ratified the decisions of the July 11 general council,” a top BJP source told DH.
The latest development is in stark contrast to the importance attached to OPS last year, especially during the elections for the post of the President and Vice-President of India, despite his expulsion from the AIADMK. The BJP did try to bring together the AIADMK and OPS faction in the Erode (east) by-polls earlier this year, but Palaniswami put his foot down, refusing to do business, in any manner, with Panneerselvam.
It was in 2017, weeks after J Jayalalithaa’s death, the BJP first courted OPS and helped him raise a banner of revolt against the then-powerful V K Sasikala with an aim to engineer a split in the AIADMK. However, OPS failed to rally party legislators around him prompting Sasikala to opt for EPS, then a lightweight politician for the post of Chief Minister.
Another leader told DH that inviting Panneerselvam to the meeting would only irk Palaniswami and the current AIADMK leadership – EPS and OPS don’t see eye-to-eye. “We know that the AIADMK stands firmly behind EPS, and one has to accept the fact that OPS is not even in the party. Going out of the way to invite OPS will only make things complicated for the alliance,” the second leader said.
However, the first leader said the BJP cannot “completely neglect” OPS by expressing the hope that a way would be found to accommodate him in the alliance closer to the 2024 Lok Sabha elections.
“We will need OPS and TTV Dhinakaran in our alliance to ensure that the Mukulathor (a dominant community to which both belong to) votes don’t get split. We will work out a solution just before the elections. But for now, we can’t deal with OPS the way we dealt with him earlier,” the leader added.
OPS too seems to have understood the political reality. At a press briefing on Tuesday, he was asked whether he was invited to the NDA meeting by the BJP. “No,” was his reply. But his faction leaders have been openly criticizing the BJP, especially the state unit, for “sidelining” OPS and his supporters.