Tamil Nadu: O Panneerselvam caught in a dilemma

Chennai: Former Chief Minister and coordinator of the rival faction of AIADMK, O Panneerselvam, who was forced to cancel a meeting of his supporters at Kanchipuram on Sunday due to incessant rains, is now said to be caught in a dilemma on reconvening the conference mainly because his supporters were restrained from using the traditional AIADMK flag at the venue of the washed out event.

While he had called for the meeting, ostensibly to commemorate the birth anniversary of C N Annadurai that actually falls on September 15, with a view to keeping his support base intact in the aftermath of his bete noire and AIADMK general secretary, Edappadi K Palaniswami, pulling up a massive show of strength at Madurai on August 20, he is now having second thoughts over reorganizing the cancelled meet.

Heavy rains that lashed the venue at Kanchipuram is said to have scattered the crowd that had gathered there with the participants running helter-skelter, some of them even holding the chairs over their heads as cover from the downpour, leaving Panneerselvam with no option other than calling off the meet.

Though it was touted that Panneerselvam, giving in to the advice of some senior leaders in his faction, might announce the launching of a new party at Kanchipuram, the police intervention at the venue to prevent the tying of AIADMK official flag (Red and Black with an image of C N Annadurai printed on it) in and around the site peeved him terribly.

He had argued with the police that no court had barred him from using the AIADMK flag but the counter argument was that he had lost all court cases staking claiming to the party and hence had no right to use the flag. In fact, the traditional party symbol, ‘Two Leaves’ had been entrusted with the Palaniswami faction by the Election Commission of India, leaving Panneerselvam with no scope of using it in any form.

However, since there was no specific order on the use of the flag, he was of the impression that he could continue using and positioning himself as a leader of an AIADMK faction. But with the AIADMK leaders asserting their right over the flag approaching the police with a complaint the meeting organisers were prevented from using it, which came as a big setback for Panneerselvam.

Also he is not sure as to how his present band of supporters, originally owing allegiance to the old united AIADMK, would react to another party launched with a new name, possibly with ‘Amma’ prefixed to the AIADMK.

But a section of leaders of his faction feel that as of now they have no political identity with no elected representative in their rolls - the one MP,  P Ravindranth Kumar, has been dismissed by the official AIADMK and is treated as an unattached member in Lok Sabha– and that it is better to gain an identity to enable the supporters rally around it.

However, Panneerselvam wants to at least hold on to the iconic party flag as his political identity like V K Sasikala, the ousted general secretary of the party, has been doing by flying it on the bonnet of her car despite several opposition to it from the AIADMK leaders.

Now with the AIADMK asserting itself vehemently after the court declaring the election of Palaniswami as general secretary legal and the Election Commission of India recognizing the faction as the real party, all the other claimants to the AIADMK legacy, Sasikala, Panneerselvam and T T V Dinakaran, have been forced to make a retreat.