Amid mounting pressure from the Opposition parties for conducting a floor test in the Assembly, the unified ruling AIADMK convened its crucial legislators meeting on Tuesday with 111 MLAs participating in it. DH photo
Amid mounting pressure from the Opposition parties for conducting a floor test in the Assembly, the unified ruling AIADMK convened its crucial legislators meeting on Tuesday with 111 MLAs participating in it.
The meeting, which was also attended by AIADMK district secretaries, passed a unanimous resolution that all the supporting legislators will go by the decisions taken by the chief minister Edappadi K Palaniswami.
Emerging out of the party headquarters, senior AIADMK leader and Fisheries minister D Jayakumar claimed that a total of 111 MLAs have attended the meeting and it was a big victory for the party".
"All the MLAs duly signed the resolution supporting Palaniswami", the minister said adding "two MLAs could not attend the meeting due to health reasons".
Jayakumar further claimed that of the 21 MLAs, who were supporting "ousted" leader TTV Dhinakaran, nine legislators staying at a resort in Puducherry called Palaniswami on Tuesday morning and extended their support.
"Those nine MLAs could not come to the meeting since they were forced to stay in the resort", Jayakumar alleged.
According to the minister's claim altogether the united AIADMK has the support of 125 legislators with three friendly party MLAs--Karunaas, Thamimun Ansari and Thaniyarasu, who won the polls on AIADMK symbol, too extending their cooperation.
AIADMK sources also said that the meeting also discussed removing jailed VK Sasikala from the party during the general council meet, which will be held on September 12.
Meanwhile, MLAs supporting Dhinakaran said that the legislators meeting conducted by Palaniswami was against the law.
"Only party's general secretary VK Sasikala has the powers to call for the legislators meeting. Since she is in prison, the meeting should be conducted by the party deputy general secretary Dhinakaran. Therefore, the meeting organised by Palaniswami is against the party law", MLA Thangatamilselvan, the staunch supporter of Dhinakaran, said.
The AIADMK had 134 members in the Assembly (excluding the Speaker) and this had fallen to 113 without the support of the Dhinakaran faction, which consists of 21
MLAs.
To prove the majority Palaniswami government need 117 members. At this juncture, If there is a floor test conducted in the Assembly, Palaniswami government will fall short of four legislators. The Tamil Nadu Assembly has 234 seats. One seat is vacant due to the death of AIADMK leader J Jayalalithaa.
Of the 233 members, the DMK has 89 members, the Congress-8 and the Indian Union Muslim League (IUML)-1. Speaker P Dhanapal can exercise his vote only in case of a tie.