Dhinakaran meets Sasikala, says will go to party headquarters

CHENNAI: After a meeting with AIADMK (Amma) general secretary V.K. Sasikala, her nephew and party deputy general secretary T.T.V. Dhinakaran asserted that no one had the authority to stop him from visiting the party headquarters.     

Dhinakaran's aggressive tone after his meeting with Sasikala at  Parappana Agrahara prison in Bengaluru on Wednesday indicated that he had obtained the green signal from his aunt for his showdown with Chief Minister Edappadi K. Palaniswami. This is his first meeting with Sasikala after allegations of facilities and concessions to her in prison surfaced.

“I will certainly visit the party headquarters. I will give the timing of my visit later”, he said. It is not known if Dhinakaran would visit the party headquarters after a tour around the state to mobilise cadre support or force an immediate confrontation on August 5.

He declined to answer questions about Finance Minister D. Jayakumar's assertion that the party was not worried about Dhinakaran. “There is no need to answer Jayakumar ”, he said and added that few people are afraid that supporting him would bring problems.

Dhinakaran said he would tour around the state to strength the party for the Parliament elections. He also said party work had been neglected for the last three months and he start discharging his duty as deputy general secretary.

When asked about the support of MLAs to him, Dhinakaran casually said all the 122 MLAs supported him and added that he had no connection with the state government.

He said he would undertake a statewide tour and hold public meetings in district headquarters where he would speak about the functioning of the government and the chief 
minister.

 He also denied any special privileges to Sasikala in prison and said he would file a defamatory case against former Karnataka DIG, prisons, D Roopa for levelling baseless charges. The AIADMK would support BJP nominee Venkaiah Naidu in the vice president elections, he said.