Tamil Nadu: EPS firms up AIADMK ties with BJP

Chennai: AIADMK general secretary Edappadi K Palaniswami presence at the NDA meeting in New Delhi on Thursday is seen as his party firming up ties with the BJP that is reaching out to its coalition partners in the wake of the INDIA alliance firming up its alliance and also to put pressure on the Union Government to shift the investigation into the Kodanad Estate robbery and murder case to the CBI.

With the Special Investigation Team of the State police recently interrogating C Dhanabal, the brother of the prime suspect in the case Kanagaraj who died mysteriously, the talk is that Palaniswami might be summoned for questioning.

Since Palaniswami, who has been claiming that he has nothing to do with the case, is averse to the idea of being dragged into the issue, he wants the investigation to be handed over to the CBI as he fears that the State Police might be hostile towards him.

It is also said that Palaniswami had always wanted to stick to the BJP through many leaders in his party felt that having a tie up with the BJP might affect their popularity in the State only because he could rely on the party holding the reins of the Union Government to unshackle himself from the Kodanad robbery and murder case.

The investigations into the intriguing crime that happened in 2017 at the estate owned by former Chief Minister J Jayalalithaa in Nilgiris district had led the police nowhere close to solving it, despite the CB-CID taking it up in 2022 after the DMK came to power.

Now, Dhanabal is speaking out, even to the media, about what his brother had told him, while Dhanabal’s wife had claimed that the brothers were not on talking terms. Her suspicion is that someone was prompting him to say things that might point fingers at Palaniswami.

So, it is suspected that Palaniswami now wants the Union Government to order a CBI probe into the case and not let the State Police continue with the investigations as he feared that he might be framed.

After the meeting of NDA partners, Palaniswami, it was rumoured, wanted to meet Union Home Minister and BJP President J P Nadda.