Will AIADMK supporters vote for DMK in Vikravandi?

Chennai: Who will benefit from the AIADMK’s boycott of the July 10 Vikravandi by-election to the State Assembly? While this question has been bogging down many in various parties even as the campaign picked up momentum, it has triggered an acrimonious war of words between leaders of the DMK and AIADMK.

While the DMK leaders are hopeful that the AIADMK supporters would only vote for the DMK and not any other party in the event of the AIADMK pulling out of the race, the AIADMK leaders are confident that they would follow the party diktat and keep away from the elections and not vote for DMK at any cost.

It began with DMK Minister K Ponmudi telling a meeting of DMK functionaries at Vikravandi that the AIADMK supporters would like to vote for the DMK if their party was not in the race and hence working accordingly to harness those votes.

Reaction to that former Minister and DMK honcho D Jayakumar told media persons in the Chennai that AIADMK members and supporters who would vote for the ‘Two Leaves’ symbol would not vote for any other symbol.They would only abide by the party’s decision to boycott the polls, he said.

DMK Organisation Secretary R S Barathi challenged AIADMK general secretary Edappadi K Palaniswami to issue a diktat that anyone who voted for the DMK candidate in the Vikravandi by election would be expelled for the party. He said DMK would only be the natural alternative for the voters if AIADMK had pulled out.

The president of the Dravidar Kazhagam (DK), K Veeramani, in a statement, said that the AIADMK’s boycott of the polls was to indirectly help the BJP alliance. He pointed out that in the campaign for the just concluded Lok Sabha polls, the AIADMK had refrained from criticizing the BJP.

Away from this humdrum of political exchanges happening outside Vikaravandi constituency per se, on the actual electoral battlefield the war cries have begun with both the PMK and DMK, the main contenders for the seat reaching out to the people.

Meanwhile the founder of AMMK T T V Dinakaran said that it was the fear of defeat that prevented Palaniswami from fielding a candidate in Vikravandi.

Ousted AIADMK general secretary V K Sasikala expressed consternation over the present status of the AIADMK that had declined to the third position in the State from the level of the third biggest party in the country, where J Jayalalithaa left it.

PMK’s top campaigners are in the field canvassing votes for their candidate C Anbumani and so are the DMK honchos who have been assigned the task of ensuring the victory of their nominee Anniyur Siva. Even Chief Minister M K Stalin is expected to campaign for DMK after June 28 when the Assembly session concludes.

Speaking to media persons at her residence in Poes Garden, opposite to Jayalalithaa’s Veda Nilayam, Sasikala said the time had come for her to save the party from total disintegration and that she would embark on a State-wide tour to bring all AIADMK supporters together.

Three other former AIADMK leaders, JCD Prabhakar, K C Palanisamy and Pugazhenthi, who have also embarked on a mission to unite the AIADMK, have written to both Palaniswami and his bete noire O Panneerselvam .