CHENNAI: Honouring its promise made during the 2024 Lok Sabha elections, the DMK on Wednesday announced its list of candidates for the upcoming Rajya Sabha elections, confirming that Makkal Needhi Maiam founder and actor Kamal Haasan will enter Parliament later in June. The announcement comes as Haasan awaits the release of his big-budget film Thug Life, slated for early June.
On the day elections were announced, TNIE had reported that Kamal will be given the opportunity instead of giving a second term for MDMK leader Vaiko, DMK’s another ally whose tenure in RS is ending.
Moreover, as predicted by TNIE, incumbent DMK Rajya Sabha MP MM Abdullah and M Shanmugam were not given a second term while senior advocate P Wilson has been given a second term.
Interestingly, DMK’s list sprung a surprise by nominating renowned feminist writer and poet A. Rokkaiah Malik, well-known by her pen name Salma.
The other person nominated is SR Sivalingam, a senior DMK functionary from Salem who has previously served as MLA.
Though elections have been announced for six vacancies, with the strength of DMK and its allies, the party will be able to send four MPs. A release by the ruling party announced its three candidates and said that the fourth seat has been allotted to MNM.
Meanwhile, MNM’s executive and administrative committees met on Wednesday and unanimously decided to nominate its founder Kamal for the seat. The party also appealed to all the parties in the DMK-led alliance in Tamil Nadu to extend their support for Kamal.
As reported by TNIE earlier, sources said Abdullah was not given another term as he has plans to play an active role in State’s politics by contesting in an MLA seat from Pudukkottai district, depending on the decision of the party.
Salma, who also belongs to the minority Muslim community as Abdullah, unsuccessfully contested the 2006 assembly election from Marungapuri assembly constituency, which later became the Manapparai constituency.
Importantly, among the three popular DMK leaders in Salem, which is the home turf of leader of the opposition and AIADMK general secretary Edappadi K Palaniswami, Sivalingam was the one who had been without any key post until now. ‘Salem’ R Rajendran was recently made a minister in the State cabinet with tourism portfolio. Another senior leader TM Selvaganapathy is now a Lok Sabha member. Sivalingam has been given the opportunity in the place of M Shanmugam, the leader of DMK’s Labour Progressive Federation, whose tenure in RS is also coming to an end. .
Meanwhile, MDMK’s leader Duria Vaiko, Tiruchy MP, had already announced that their party would continue with the DMK alliance even though senior Vaiko was not given the seat again.