AIADMK split widens as rebel MLAs resign and join TVK
The AIADMK suffered another blow on Monday when three of its party legislators belonging to the rebel group led by senior leaders C V Shanmugam and S P Velumani resigned and are set to join the ruling TVK, prompting “horse-trading” charges from the opposition DMK and AIADMK. AIADMK chief Edappadi K Palaniswami lashed out at the “fraud jobs” of the TVK government and said such things were new to Tamil Nadu politics. He called the resignation episode a “pre-planned conspiracy.”
The development comes weeks after the AIADMK lost the April 23 polls, the fourth major drubbing since 2019, its MLAs split into two groups, each supporting party general secretary Palaniswami and the Shanmugam-Velumani duo. The two camps took divergent positions on the TVK government’s floor test, with the Palaniswami faction voting against it and the 25-member group on the other side backing the C Joseph Vijay-led government, which won the confidence vote.
With Speaker JCD Prabhakar accepting the resignation of the three MLAs, the strength of the AIADMK has dropped to 44 from 47 in the 234-member Assembly. The Speaker said the EC will be communicated on the resignation. Soon after meeting the Speaker, the three legislators–Maragatham Kumaravel, P Sathyabama, and S Jayakumar— met senior TVK leader and PWD minister Aadhav Arjuna. Kumaravel said, “We are going to join TVK in Panayur (party hq),” later in the day.
The Speaker accepted the resignation of the three legislators — Kumaravel, who won from Maduranthakam, Sathyabama from Dharapuram, and Jayakumar, who got elected from Perundurai Assembly constituency — on AIADMK tickets. With MLAs resigning, a by-election will happen within six months.
Meanwhile, five MLAs from the Shanmugam-Velumani camp went back to party chief Palaniswami. The three were among the 25 legislators who voted in support of the C Joseph Vijay-led TVK government during the May 13 floor test, defying the party diktat. The five AIADMK MLAs who had been in the Shanmugam-Velumani camp shifted their allegiance back to party chief Palaniswami. With this, the number of Palaniswami-supporting MLAs in the Assembly has risen to 27. The legislators who left the Velumani camp included S M Sukumar (Arcot).
With three resignations and five MLAs going back to the Palaniswami camp, the strength of the rebel side has now reduced to 17, from 25. With the Speaker accepting the resignations, Tamil Nadu will witness by-elections in four Assembly constituencies, including the Tiruchirappalli East constituency vacated by Vijay.
The resignation and split in the AIADMK have come within 21 days of the declaration of the Assembly election results. Post poll, this is a major jolt for the AIADMK. The DMK too has suffered a setback with its allies, the Congress, VCK, and IUML joining the TVK government, and the Left parties extending their support to the Vijay-led dispensation. Amidst a speculation of a rapprochement between the AIADMK factions, the five legislators who had supported Shanmugam called on Palaniswami at his Greenways Road residence here and merged themselves with the party.
Later, the group met Prabhakar and submitted a letter stating that they would function under the leadership of Palaniswami. “We gave a letter to our general secretary expressing regret over some mistakes during the floor test in the Assembly. We said all five of us will function under his leadership and return to the AIADMK,” Sukumar said. The other MLAs are P Haribaskar from Anthiyur, Dilipan Jaishankar from Sankarankoil, N S N Natarajan from Kangayam, and K Mohan from Panrutti.
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