Chennai: Madras High Court on Wednesday served a notice to the Tamil Nadu Speaker in the case filed by Opposition DMK seeking disqualification of 12 rebel AIADMK legislators for voting against the government at the floor test early this year. Among them was O Paneerselvam who resigned as Chief Minister then and later joined the Cabinet as Deputy Chief Minister after merger of the warring groups in the party.

DMK counsel argued that Speaker P Dhanapal had erred in not disqualifying the Paneerselvam-led rebel MLAs when they who voted against the trust vote sought by Chief Minister Edappadi K Palaniswami.

The court issued notices to the Speaker and the Assembly Secretary, posting the case to October 12.

Panneerselvam was forced to resign as Chief Minister in February by the then party interim general secretary VK Sasikala. He had the support of 11 MLAs. When Sasikala landed in jail in the DA case, Palaniswami took over as Chief Minister on February 16 with her blessings.

Palaniswami won the floor test on February 18 despite Panneerselvam and his 11 members voting against the motion. The DMK argues that the Speaker should have disqualified the 12 rebel MLAs.