Politics ahead of the Assembly election hots up in Tamil Nadu after ousted AIADMK leader V K Sasikala’s release. In a reply to the ambitions of Sasikala and her nephew, TTV Dhinakaran, chief minister and AIADMK joint co-ordinator Edappadi K Palaniswami on Tuesday said those who support Dinakaran will be ‘left in the lurch.’

With this, for the first time after Sasikala’s release, Palaniswami expressed his strong will to counter AMMK leader Dhinakaran’s renewed assertion of ‘retrieving’ the ruling AIADMK.

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He also indicated he was ready to face the challenge that the Mannargudi clan (Sasikala family) was putting ahead of the Assembly election.

Earlier in the day, Dhinakaran had said efforts to ‘retrieve’ the ruling party will be on, especially after Sasikala’s return from Bengaluru, after serving a four- year jail term in disproportionate assets case.

Sasikala also while addressing her supporters en route to Chennai said now she would be in active politics to restore Amma rule in the state. Palaniswami while addressing an election rally in Vellore, cited the example of 18 disqualified AIADMK rebel MLAs who sided with Dhinakaran earlier, to drive home his point on Dhinakaran’s betrayel of his cadres.

MLAs loyal to Dhinakaran were disqualified when they rebelled against Palaniswami in 2017 after he merged his faction with that of his present deputy O Panneerselvam. Targeting Dhinakaran, Palaniswami said he was not even an AIADMK member for 10 years, referring to his expulsion by late chief minister and then party supremo J Jayalalithaa in 2011, along with her confidante Sasikala, whom she later reinstated, and others. “He himself declared he had joined the party again after Amma’s (Jayalalithaa) death. He made so many efforts to wrest control of the party after joining. He held 18 of our MLAs under his control. Later he left them in the lurch,” the chief minister alleged. He said efforts were on to see that there was a setback to AIADMK and enable DMK to come to power and challenged the party will counter that too.

Palaniswami lashed out at DMK, dubbing it a ‘coprorate’ company helmed by M K Stalin as its ‘chairman’. He slammed the DMK over the release of seven life convicts in the Rajiv Gandhi assassination case, recalling that the party government, under late M Karunanidhi, had recommended implementation of death ordered by the court.

He claimed it was the late Jayalalithaa who brought an Assembly resolution, demanding the release of all seven later. He pointed out his Cabinet had adopted a similar resolution in 2018. He alleged DMK is fooling people with demand to release the convicts from jail despite these facts.