CHENNAI: AIADMK general secretary Edappadi K Palaniswami will be meeting Union Home Minister Amit Shah, who is the election strategist of the BJP, in New Delhi on April 26 or 27. The meeting assumes significance as it takes place after the Election Commission recognised Palaniswami as the general secretary of AIADMK.
Besides, this is the first meeting between the two leaders after the recent strain in the relationship between the two parties.
Issues between AIADMK and the BJP’s state unit and preliminary talks for 2024 Lok Sabha elections are likely to be taken up during Palaniswami’s meeting with Shah. Incidentally, top leaders of the BJP did not give an audience to expelled leader O Panneerselvam.
Recently, BJP state president K Annamalai said that he would release corruption charges against all parties which were in power in the state. This drew strong criticism from AIADMK’s second-rung leaders. Party’s organising secretary D Jayakumar had said that Annamalai could target the DMK, but not the AIADMK. If he does, it would be tantamount to playing with fire.
A few days ago, when reporters at Omalur posed repeated queries about Annamalai’s remarks, Palaniswami said, “Please ask about matured politicians and I will react.”
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He also said that Annamalai was trying to become a big leader through press meets. However, despite all the bitter developments, top leaders of the two parties have been maintaining that their alliance continues.
Annamalai had, during a party meeting last month, reportedly expressed displeasure over continuing the alliance with AIADMK for the 2024 Lok Sabha elections. Since then, Annamalai has been repeatedly saying that corruption is the central issue in Tamil Nadu and that he would fight against it.