Actor indeed! Karunaas changes tack

CHENNAI: In a swift volte-face, MLA and actor S Karunaas, who had been siding with AMMK leader TTV Dhinakaran for the past many months, met Chief Minister Edappadi K Palaniswami on Wednesday with a set of demands for ‘welfare schemes’ for his constituency Thiruvadanai. The move was viewed as a patch up effort by the actor-turned-neta. Karunaas had been a vocal critic of the Chief Minister.

He was arrested on September 23 and later released on bail. As recently as last week, he asserted that he would move a resolution to remove Speaker P Dhanapal as he was allegedly acting in a biased manner. 24 hours ago, he reiterated the same, saying he does not care if his motion fails, he was even ready to lose his membership in the Assembly.

By Wednesday morning, all that became history. He shared new year greetings with the Chief Minister and other ministers.

When asked about his volte-face, Karunaas told Express: “My advocates told me that the resolution would not succeed in Assembly as I did not have 35 MLAs to support it.  So, I decided to withdraw my petition against the Speaker. Besides, I have given a detailed memorandum on the welfare schemes to be implemented in my constituency. The Chief Minister had agreed to do the needful.”