Three-time chief minister and expelled AIADMK leader O. Panneerselvam and his supporters on Friday joined the DMK in the presence of Chief Minister M.K. Stalin at the DMK headquarters in Chennai. Panneerselvam, popularly known as OPS, is likely to contest from his fiefdom, Bodinayakkanaur in Theni district, in the upcoming election, while his supporters are also likely to contest from a few constituencies in south Tamil Nadu.
“People of Tamil Nadu want M.K. Stalin to win the election,” OPS told the media after joining the DMK.
The 75-year-old leader chose to join the DMK following his legal battles in court and before the Election Commission of India (ECI), after his unsuccessful attempt to return to the AIADMK. The BJP—which once mediated a truce between former CM OPS and AIADMK General Secretary Edappadi K. Palaniswami (EPS)—also left him in the lurch.
OPS, in fact, acted as per the instructions of the BJP and chose to remain silent even when EPS refused to accommodate him back into the party.
He contested from Ramanathapuram in an independent symbol in the 2024 Lok Sabha election, by being part of the NDA. But, OPS’s efforts to regain control of the AIADMK or even a mere return to the party turned unsuccessful.
In August, Panneerselvam withdrew from the NDA, saying that he was “insulted” by the BJP camp. However, he called on Union Home Minister Amit Shah during the end of 2025 to convey his interest to get back into the NDA fold. The BJP, which worked out a strategy to take back TTV Dhinakaran’s AMMK into the alliance, could not convince EPS to accommodate OPS.
“Amit Shah told me that the DMK alliance is strong enough to win the election. I pleaded with him to reunite the AIADMK and bring the warring groups back together. He said he tried to persuade, but EPS did not listen to him,” OPS told the reporters from his hometown, Theni, on Sunday.
OPS, who had been sending feelers to the DMK for months, called on Stalin at his residence recently and also met him during a morning walk. Sources suggest these informal meetings were the first steps toward OPS joining the DMK—the very party he had spent his entire political career opposing.
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OPS’s supporters R. Vaithilingam and Paul Manoj Pandian resigned their MLA posts and joined the DMK a few months ago. But for OPS, the decision wasn’t an easy one, as he was a staunch loyalist of Jayalalithaa and served as the chief minister of the state whenever she had to step aside due to legal troubles.
Jayalalithaa, in fact, once called him the “loyalist”, and he climbed up to be the party treasurer. Sources close to him say that some of his relatives in the Theni district were not comfortable about OPS joining the DMK. But the decision came as OPS’s political future had hit a roadblock. “This decision will ensure a political future for him and also for his sons. But the AIADMK has lost its face in the south,” one of his family members told THE WEEK.
