Vijayakant, the DMDK leader, is facing a major rebellion in his own party with five MlAs and ten district secretaries revolting against him on Tuesday for aligning with the People’s Welfare Front.
According to VC Chandra Kumar, the dissident leader, the five MlAs and ten district secretaries of the DMDK would walk out of the party if Vijayakant fails to align with the DMK by Wednesday evening. Vijayakant, who has not been seen in public for the last one week, retaliated within minutes by throwing out all the five dissident MlAs and district secretaries from the party. Other constituents in the PWF termed the action of the dissidents a deep rooted conspiracy hatched by the DMK.
Captain Gnanappazham (Divine Fruit), as Vijayakant is addressed by wife Premalatha, was given 24 hours by Chandra Kumar and the rebels to align with the DMK. “The DMDK leadership’s decision to align with the four-party People’s Welfare Front is against the wish of the majority section of the cadre and leaders. We all know that the PWF is a B team of the AIADMK. The DMDK has been waging a war against the corrupt AIADMK Government for the last five years. The PWF has been launched to help Jayalalithaa regain power in the 2016 election,” said Chandra Kumar while addressing a hurriedly convened press meet at Chennai Press Club on Tuesday.
Chandra Kumar, a DMDK MlA in the outgoing assembly is also the propaganda secretary of the party. The revolt by Chandra Kumar and gang comes immediately after the exit of S Dinesh, Kanyakumari district secretary of the DMDK who joined the DMK on last Saturday. Dinesh was accompanied by senior leaders of the farmers’ wing of the DMDK who had declared that more leaders would leave the party in the next few days.
There were reports that the DMK, which wanted the DMDK to side with it to face the Assembly election was upset with Vijayakant following his refusal to align with the Karunanidhi clan. “A deep rooted conspiracy has been hatched by the DMK’s top leaders to poach senior leaders of the DMDK to weaken that party as well as the PWF. The DMK had succeeded in making many MDMK leaders too to switch over their loyalty following Vaiko’s refusal to align with it,” G Ramakrishnan, the CPI(M) state secretary and one of the founders of the PWF told The Pioneer.