Former CM Palaniswami set to become Leader of Opposition elected AIADMK legislature party leader

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    Chennai, May 10 (PTI) Top AIADMK leader K Palaniswami
was on Monday unanimously elected leader of the legislature
party after about a three-hour meet here and he is all set to
become the Leader of Opposition in the Tamil Nadu Assembly.
    The meeting of the newly-elected MLAs to elect the
legislature party leader, the second within three days,
reportedly saw exchanges on who should lead the party in the
House with one section pitching for Palaniswami and the other
for coordinator O Panneerselvam.
    Eventually, the party announced in a statement that
Palaniswami was elected leader of the legislature party. In a
joint statement, Palaniswami and Panneerselvam said the
election was unanimous.
    Later, party leaders called on Tamil Nadu Assembly
Secretary K Srinivasan and handed over a letter on
Palaniswami's election.
    The MLAs meet on May 7 here ended without deciding on
who the legislature party leader should be as the consensus
building exercise did not apparently succeed.
    For a while today, when the legislators meeting was in
progress at the party headquarters, social media was abuzz
claiming that another leader, former Assembly Speaker P
Dhanapal's name was being considered to overcome differences.
    In view of the gathering of the MLAs, the AIADMK
headquarters and the vicinity were teeming with cadres and
there were some wall posters hailing Panneerselvam and asking
him to 'become' the leader of opposition.
    Supporters of Palaniswami could be seen around, who
were confident of his election by virtue of his 'strong work'
for the party.
    Interestingly, some wall posters close to the party
office praised V K Sasikala as the 'permanent general
secretary', and wanted her to assume the 'top leadership' of
the party. She and her nephew TTV Dhinakaran were removed from
the party in 2017.
    The AIADMK won a total of 66 Assembly segments out of
the total 234, and the outcome also proved that the western
region, the home turf of Palaniswami continued to be a
stronghold of the party.
    In southern Tamil Nadu, Theni district being the
native of Panneerselvam, the party saw its archrival DMK
beating it convincingly. Factors such as these reportedly
stood Palaniswami in good stead.
AIAMDK's allies, the PMK and BJP won five and four
seats respectively and together they have 75 seats.
The DMK won 133 seats which includes seats of the
allies like MDMK and in total, DMK and its partners including
Congress emerged victorious in 159 segments.
    Palaniswami was the chief minister for four years
between 2017 and 2021 while Panneerselvam assumed office as
deputy chief minister in 2017 after the factions led by the
two leaders merged.
    The party event witnessed deployment of a posse of
policemen in the area and several police personnel were seen
with protective, riot shields and helmets. As party workers
swelled in the neighbourhood, some personnel with megaphones
reminded people on COVID-19 guidelines.
In 2006, when DMK captured power and AIADMK lost the
Assembly polls, Panneerselvam was the leader of opposition for
a very short time and then, late party supremo J Jayalalithaa
became the leader of opposition.PTI VGN SS
PTI PTI

(This story has not been edited by THE WEEK and is auto-generated from PTI)