CHENNAI: With AIADMK gearing up to face the Lok Sabha elections after quitting National Democratic Alliance (NDA), party general secretary Edappadi K Palnaiswami on Wednesday effected significant changes in the party apparatus.
Former ministers G Baskaran and A Anwar Raajhaa, former chief whip of the government, R Manoharan, former secretary of Vellore rural district V Ramu, former councillor Royapuram Mano, Durai Senthil and R Gandhi of Thanjavur district have been appointed as organising secretaries of the party. Former MLA IS Inbadurai will be the secretary of advocates wing of AIADMK. Former minister S Abdul Raheem has been appointed as minorities wing secretary. Sources said after many years, the party has appointed a woman district secretary - L Jayasudha (Thiruvannamalai central).
The other appointments include actor Vindhya and S Ayyaduraipandiyan (deputy propaganda secretaries), and Dr P Saravanan, former MLA from Thiruparankundram constituency as joint secretary of the doctors’ wing. Meanwhile, Palaniswami has reorganised seven party districts into 14 and appointed secretaries. The reorganised districts and their secretaries are: Ranipet East (K Ravi), Ranipet West (SM Sugumar), Thiruvannamalai East (former minister S Ramachandran), Thiruvannamalai north (Thoosi K Mohan), Thiruvannamalai south (former minister Agri SS Krishnamurthy), Thanjavur east (RK Bharathimohan), Thanjavur west (M Rethinasamy), Thanjavur central (M Sekar), Thanjavur south (CVe Shekar), Theni east (Murukkodi MP Ramar), Theni west (STK Jaggaiyan), Tirunveli town(Thachai N Ganesaraja) and Tirunelveli rural (Isakki Subbaiah). Anbazhagan has been appointed as the state secretary of AIADMK’s Puducherry unit.
As the senior functionaries of AIADMK and BJP are keeping silent after the former snapped ties with the latter, speculations were rife on Wednesday that Assam Chief Minister Himanta Biswa Sarma has commenced negotiations with AIADMK top brass for the re-entry of the party into the NDA fold again. However, a senior leader of AIADMK told TNIE he was not aware of any such efforts and that such reports could be rumours.
When asked whether he would be part of the alliance to be formed by the BJP in Tamil Nadu, former chief minister O Panneerselvam said he will announce that on Thursday evening.
Panruti S Ramachandran, advisor to the faction led by Panneerselvam would make the announcement.