Chennai: A day after TTV Dinakaran and his aunt and jailed leader VK Sasikala were ousted from AIADMK leadership, the rebel leader breathed fire on Wednesday and said he would pull down the government, “in the interests of the AIADMK and to save the party”. Addressing media persons outside his Adyar residence on Wednesday, Dinakaran read out the riot act against the EPS-OPS combine and said that people and cadres were with him.

“I have 21 MLAs with me and these are the MLAs who did not attend the yesterday’s meeting. It is not a general council meeting as it was not convened by either general secretary or deputy general secretary, that is me,” he told media persons adding that “the decisions taken by the meeting were illegal and more over they will be under the scrutiny of the Madras High Court when the case comes up on October 23.”

This government is a minority one. “Other than the 21 MLAs, there are sleeper cells that will get active. We will show what are sleeper cells on the floor of the house,” Dinakaran said and at one time the usually affable leader got visibly upset and lost his cool to a question on the exact number of MLAs who were with him.

“Why are you asking motivated question. How can I reveal the numbers or names, when the government is sending police to threaten the MLAs at the Coorg resort,” he questioned and alleged that the government was offering money as allurement for their return. One MLA had gone away, but for what reason, I do not know, he said.

The rebel leader said that he will wait till September 16, after giving sufficient time for the governor to act on his memorandum and if no action is forthcoming, he would take action after consulting his party colleagues. “EPS does not have 117 members needed for majority, everyone knows this and everyone also knows how many MLAs are with us at Coorg,” he said.

What the EPS and OPS must realise is that there is no legal sanction to the general council meeting, where many general council members did not attend.

In a midnight action, TTV Dinakran also sacked EPS from all key posts he had held. Something that was laughed away by a senior leader D Jayakumar, who questioned who was Dinakaran to take action on party matters, when he was removed from the post of deputy general secretary.

When asked if he was hand in glove with the DMK, Dinakran explained that DMK was his principal political enemy and that he could never join hands with that party. “In future too we will not go with them,” he said.