CHENNAI: In a bid to win the four assembly constituencies which go to bypoll on May 19, the DMK has appointed an army of former state and Union ministers along with sitting and former MLAs, to gain an upper hand in the State assembly.
It is learnt that the main opposition party in the State has appointed 14 former state ministers, three union ministers and many sitting MLAs and former MLAs as in-charge for the four assembly constituencies where bypoll will be held on May 19. Eighteen of the 22 constituencies went to polls on April 18.
The by-elections will decide the fate of the Tamil Nadu government which currently has 114 out of the 234 seats while the DMK alliance has 97 in the assembly.
The DMK, which is striving hard to capture all the 22 seats to regain power in the State, has deployed various bigwigs of the party which include three former union ministers and Kanimozhi, the candidate of Thoothukudi parliamentary constituency, to take care of campaign and poll-related works.
K Anbazhagan, DMKs’ general secretary, has stated that former minister I Periyasamy and M Manimaran, Madurai South district unit secretary, have been appointed as overall in-charge for Thiruparankundram assembly constituency which falls in Madurai district.
Former ministers and sitting MLAs, Thangam Thennarasu, KR Periyakaruppan and 11 other sitting MLAs and former MLAs of various assembly constituencies, have also been deployed as in-charge for various parts of the Thiruparankundram assembly constituency.
Similarly, for the Ottapidaram assembly constituency, which falls in Thoothukudi district, former ministers and MLAs KN Nehru and Anitha Radhakrishnan have been appointed as overall in-charge. Under them, Rajya Sabha MP Kanimozhi has been appointed as an in-charge for Thoothukudi union, which falls under the same assembly constituency.
Likewise, former ministers and MLAs - KKSSR Ramachandran, N Suresh Rajan, P Geetha Jeevan, former union minister K Ragupathi and former Chennai Mayor M Subramanian and other sitting MLAs have been deployed for various parts of the Ottapidaram assembly constituency.
For the Aravakuruchi assembly constituency, which falls in Karur district, former state ministers K Ponmudi, S Muthusamy, T M Selvaganapathy, MRK Panneerselvam, former union minister S Gandhi Selvan and many sitting MLAs, have been appointed as in-charge. Likewise, for Sulur assembly constituency, former state ministers EV Velu, T M Anbarasan and former union minister A Raja and many MLAs and former MLAs of various constituencies, have been appointed as in-charge for various parts of the constituency.
A DMK MLA, who is also deployed as an in-charge for one of the four assembly constituencies, spoke to Express, on condition of anonymity, “It is very crucial for us, as the DMK alliance currently has 97 MLAs in the assembly. We can change the government only if we manage to win all the 22 assembly seats. Hence, our party has decided to send all the sitting MLAs and former MLAs, who have the chances to win seats in the next election, to carry out the election works with utmost care. We believe that the election arena in the State is most favourable to us. We don’t want to lose even a single vote. Without achieving success in the four seats, we (DMK) can’t change anything in Tamil Nadu politics even we are successful in the 18 assembly constituencies, where in bypoll was held on April 18 along with parliamentary poll.”