On the All India Anna Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam’s (AIADMK) party leadership dispute, the Madras High Court on Friday, September 2, allowed AIADMK leader K Palaniswami's appeal, setting aside an order in favour of O Panneerselvam. A division bench, comprising Justices M Duraiswamy and Sundar Mohan, set aside an order of a single judge, which nullified the July 11 General Council (GC) meeting of the AIADMK.
In the said general council meeting held in July, Leader of Opposition Edappadi K Palaniswami was elected as the interim general secretary of the party, the top post and Panneerselvam was ousted from the party.
The division bench quashed the August 17 order of Justice G Jayachandran, which ordered maintenance of status-quo ante as of June 23. On that day in June, Panneerselvam was the Coordinator and Palaniswami the Joint Coordinator. Through this order today, the court — refraining from passing any orders related to the posts of CoOrdinator and Joint Co-Ordinator — the court observed that EPS cannot be “compelled to continue in the said post” after he said that the posts lapsed, OPS also “cannot take any decision independently”. The court added that this shall be decided via the other pending cases.
The court order has only set aside the August 17 order and restored the appointment of Palaniswami as the interim general secretary of the party, and allowed appeals challenging the nullification of the general council meeting.
The dispute within the AIADMK started on June 15, when senior party leader and former Minister D Jayakumar put forth the demand of unitary leadership. While it was anticipated that the decision would be taken at the general council meeting on June 23, OPS went to the Madras High Court seeking to stay the meeting. However, the court refused to do so, and OPS approached the apex court. The court while passing this order said that while the meeting can take place as per the schedule, they “should not be permitted to pass any resolutions to change the bye-law of the party”.
Meanwhile, as many as 2,342 members raised the demand to discuss single leadership during the first General Council meeting, held on June 23. This meeting also witnessed a scuffle between EPS and OPS factions, with the latter being abused and attacked by supporters of Edappadi Palaniswami. The general council meeting was then postponed to July 11.
After this, opposing this restraining order by the HC that no amendment should be made to laws, EPS went to the Supreme Court on June 28. The SC, after hearing the petition, stayed the Madras HC order, following which the meeting was held on July 11. In this meeting, EPS was made the interim head of the AIADMK and a special resolution was passed to expel OPS and his supporters from the party. In return, OPS announced that he sacked EPS from the party. Since then, both the factions have been claiming ownership to the party and expelling each others’ supporters from the party.
(With PTI inputs)