The long brewing dissent in the Desiya Murpokku Dravida Kazhagam (DMDK) reached its climax with the eight rebel MLAs of the party tendering their resignation to the Tamil Nadu Assembly Speaker. With this, the DMDK loses its status as the largest opposition party in the state assembly, and Vijayakanth, the leader of the opposition.

The MLAs who tendered their resignation are – C. Arun Pandian, M. Arun Subramanian, K. Pandiarajan, K. Tamilazhagan, S. Michael Rayappan, R. Sundarrajan, T. Suresh Kumar, and R. Santhi. In addition, A. Ramasamy (Puthiya Tamizhagam) and Kalai Arasu (PMK) have also tendered their resignations.

The DMDK, led by actor-politician Vijayakanth, won 28 seats in the 2011 assembly elections. The party was initially an ally of the ruling AIADMK. But, differences of opinion led it to break away from the alliance, making it the principal opposition party in the Tamil Nadu assembly, displacing the DMK, which, under the leadership of M. Karunanidhi, had secured only 23 seats.

“Since eight legislators from the DMDK have resigned, as per rule 2(O) of the Tamil Nadu Assembly, Speaker Dhanapal has announced that Vijayakanth’s DMDK has lost the principal opposition leader status in the House,” A.M.P Jamaludeen, Assembly Secretary, said.

The trouble had become apparent for a while now. All the eight DMDK MLAs had met Jayalalithaa separately months ago and expressed their support to the AIADMK government’s welfare schemes. Although they belonged to the DMDK, the rebel MLAs were given separate seats in the Assembly.

DMDK chief Vijayakanth had suspended the rebel MLAs from the party in June 2013 after they voted against his party candidate Elangovan in the Rajya Sabha elections.

Vijayakanth can regain his opposition leader’s status only if his party has minimum strength of 24 MLAs.