With a few more hours to go for confidence voting, Tamil Nadu’s political scene witnessed several twists and turns on Friday. Every party in the state convened a meeting of their MLAs to discuss the stand they should take during the trust vote.
Earlier in the day, AIADMK Mylapore MLA and former DGP R. Nataraj, who was said to be with the Sasikala camp, declared that he would go by his conscience during the vote of confidence.
The next twist came from E. Madhusoodhanan, the ruling AIADMK’s presidium chairman who later defected to the OPS camp. He sacked party’s new deputy general secretary T.T.V. Dinakaran and Dr S.Venkatesh from their party posts. And then it was the turn of AIADMK’s new presidium chairman K.A. Sengottaiyan who appeared before the media at the gates of the Golden Bay Resort in Koovathur and said that Madhusoodhanan did not have the rights to sack Dhinakaran and Venkatesh.
In the afternoon, a desperate Panneerselvam requested the MLAs at the Koovathur resort to go by their conscience and do justice. Later in the evening, the DMK MLAs met under its working president M.K. Stalin and announced that the DMK would vote against Edappadi Palanisamy in the confidence voting. “We have decided to vote against Palanisamy,” Stalin told the media after the meeting.
Subsequently the Tamil Nadu Congress Committee with its eight MLAs have also decided to vote against Palanisamy.
Meanwhile, the Koovathur Golden Bay resort, according to sources is full of action. All the 123 AIADMK MLAs have had brain storming sessions as to how they will have to vote. Sources say all the MLAs will be brought straight to the assembly on Saturday morning in a bus and then will be let off after the voting.
Sources say, T.T.V. Dinakaran and K.A. Sengottaiyan, along with the new chief minister Palanisamy had personally spoken to each MLA to save the government.
