April 6, 2016
The sacked three rebel MLAs and seven district secretaries of Vijayakanth’s Desiya Murpokku Dravida Kazhagam (DMDK) in Tamil Nadu have claimed that it was Premalatha who had initiated talks with the People’s Welfare Front (PWF) ignoring the DMK.
With DMDK chief Vijayakanth expelling 10 senior party functionaries on Wednesday, things took an ugly turn with the sacked rebels going public about how the party was not under the control of the actor but commanded by his wife Premalatha.
The DMDK was likely to be heading for a split with many party functionaries dissatisfied over alliance with PWF. DMDK’s propaganda secretary and MLA V.C. Chandrakumar and other MLAs said they wanted an alliance with the DMK to “save the party”.
Chandrakumar said: “If he (Vijayakanth) would have controlled the party, we would have joined DMK instead of aligning with PWF. Therefore it is very clear the party is controlled by Premalatha”.
He claimed that Premalatha had initiated talks with the PWF against the wishes of Vijayakanth.
Pointing out that they were expelled for expressing the views of the party cadre, Chandrakumar said: “The party cannot dismiss us since it has to be done in the general council meeting. Therefore, we cannot accept this”.
On their future course of action, he said that his team would be meeting other “dissatisfied” DMDK district secretaries on Thursday to decide on further steps to be taken.
“Several sitting MLAs including us refused to contest the polls”, he said alleging that several aspirants who deposited the amount were fearing that they might lose the elections.
He also claimed that many candidates, upset over Vijayakanth’s decision to ally with PWF, had expressed their unwillingness to contest the elections and some of them had even taken back their deposits. “That is why the party is yet to come out with the candidate’s list”, he said.
It may be recalled that Vijayakanth who had strongly made statements that his party would go it alone in the May 16 Assembly elections took a sudden turn and entered into an alliance with the four-party PWF on March 23.