Vaiko, the enfant terrible of Tamil Nadu politics, suffered another blow late on Monday night with four prominent leaders of his political outfit MDMK announcing their plans to join the DMK.
S Joel, the Thoothukudi district secretary, Saravanan, Perumal and Thillai Selvam , all described as close confidants of Vaiko, moved over to DMK following the party
chief’s decision to stay with the People’s Welfare Front, a loose conglomeration of the CPI, CPI(M) and the VCK.
last September saw four State-level leaders of the MDMK, including Kumari Vijayakumar, a long time associate of Vaiko, ditching him and casting their lots with the DMK. Though Vaiko remained unperturbed over the defections, hundreds of party workers have switched over to the DMK in the last three months. The reason given by the leaders who moved over to the DMK was that Vaiko’s actions have weakened the Dravidian movement in Tamil Nadu.