The Usilampatti legislator from the AIADMK, P. Ayyappan, who was until recently with the camp of the party’s co-coordinator, Edappadi K. Palaniswami, met party coordinator O. Panneerselvam to express his support.
In the 2021 Assembly elections, Mr. Ayyappan, who defeated P.V. Kathiravan of the DMK by a margin of 7,477 votes, said his decision to join the camp of Mr. Panneerselvam was in response to the latter’s call for all members of the party to come together. With the day’s development, the number of MLAs supporting Mr. Panneerselvam went up to four, including himself.
Mr. Panneerselvam, signalling that he was receptive to the idea of getting closer to former interim general secretary of the party V.K. Sasikala and general secretary of the AMMK T.T.V. Dhinakaran, said he would shortly meet those who worked for the party and under the party founder M.G. Ramachandran and former Chief Minister Jayalalithaa.
Emphasising that he was for a united AIADMK, Mr. Panneerselvam said he would meet all such persons and seek their support for the cause of unity. He was replying to a question on whether he would call on Ms. Sasikala and Mr. Dhinakaran at an interaction with journalists at his residence here.
Reiterating that the rank and file of the party were for the party to remain united, Mr. Panneerselvam dubbed as a “drama” the July 11 general council meeting [wherein he was expelled from the party and which had been declared by the Madras High Court as void].
To a question on the report submitted by a commission of inquiry, headed by Justice (retired) A. Arumughaswamy, on the circumstances leading to the hospitalisation and death of Jayalalithaa, the AIADMK coordinator replied that one could offer a comment only after going through the contents of the report.
