CHENNAI: The counsel for TTV Dhinakaran faction submitted his arguments on the dispute over the party symbol Two Leaves and sought more time for further arguments. Granting his plea, the full Bench of the Election Commission of India posted the next hearing for November 6. According to the directive from the SC, the ECI has to give its final award on the symbol dispute by November 10.
The arguments of Vijay Hansaria, counsel for the Dhinakaran faction, took the whole day on Wednesday and sought more time to submit the views from V K Sasikala’s side. He said Madhusudhanan and others, who elected late Chief Minister J Jayalalithaa as the interim general secretary of the party in 1989, had filed this dispute now against Sasikala, conveniently hiding the fact that an interim general secretary could be appointed for the AIADMK and that there was a precedent for this.
“Besides, under rule 43, only primary members can elect the general secretary and this basic tenet of the party constitution cannot be altered at any time. So, removing the general secretary post is against the party rules,” he added. Hansaria also pointed out that the Madras HC, while allowing the general council meeting of the ruling faction on September 12, clearly said that the decisions taken would be bound by its final decision.
“Now, the ruling faction is approaching the ECI to get an endorsement for the decisions taken by the general council meeting,” he added. On behalf of the EPS-OPS faction, ministers D Jayakumar, C Ve Shanmugam and R Kamaraj, V Maitreyan, K P Munusamy and Manoj Pandian took part. Eight disqualified MLAs including Thanga Thamizhselvan and many others were present from Dhinakaran’s side.