<div>Eight dissident DMDK MLAs today resigned from the Tamil Nadu Assembly and left party leader Vijaykant stripped of his status as Opposition leader in the House.<br /><br />Speaker P Dhanapal, who accepted the resignations, declared that Vijayakant has lost his Opposition Leader status since the strength of his party in the Assembly has now come down to 20 from 28.<div><br />DMDK founder Vijayakant no longer meets the "qualification" to be recognised as the Opposition Leader under relevant Assembly rules, the Speaker's Secretariat said in a release.</div><div><br />Further, with no other party having the 24 members stipulated for the same, "nobody else can be recognised as Opposition Leader", the release said quoting the Speaker.<br />DMK has 23 MLAs in the 234-member House.</div><div><br />The DMDK MLAs who tendered their resignation are -- C Arun Pandian, M Arun Subramanian, K Pandiarajan, K Tamil Azhagan, S Michael Rayappan, R Sundarrajan, T Suresh Kumar and R Santhi.<br /><br />Actor-politician Vijayakant, who made his Assembly debut in 2006 as the then lone DMDK MLA, became Opposition Leader after the 2011 elections, when his party bagged 29 seats.<br /><br />The party's senior leader and former Alandur MLA Panrutty S Ramachandran had resigned in 2014 before joining AIADMK, bringing down DMDK's strength to 28.<br /><br />Though he had joined hands with the ruling AIADMK for the 2011 elections, Vijayakant had later walked out of the alliance after a spat with Chief Minister J Jayalalithaa on the floor of the Assembly.</div><div><br />The latest development comes as the state prepares for Assembly polls later this year. DMDK is being wooed by the DMK-Congress combine, BJP and the four-party bloc, People's Welfare Front (PWF), for striking an electoral pact. <br /></div></div>
<div>Eight dissident DMDK MLAs today resigned from the Tamil Nadu Assembly and left party leader Vijaykant stripped of his status as Opposition leader in the House.<br /><br />Speaker P Dhanapal, who accepted the resignations, declared that Vijayakant has lost his Opposition Leader status since the strength of his party in the Assembly has now come down to 20 from 28.<div><br />DMDK founder Vijayakant no longer meets the "qualification" to be recognised as the Opposition Leader under relevant Assembly rules, the Speaker's Secretariat said in a release.</div><div><br />Further, with no other party having the 24 members stipulated for the same, "nobody else can be recognised as Opposition Leader", the release said quoting the Speaker.<br />DMK has 23 MLAs in the 234-member House.</div><div><br />The DMDK MLAs who tendered their resignation are -- C Arun Pandian, M Arun Subramanian, K Pandiarajan, K Tamil Azhagan, S Michael Rayappan, R Sundarrajan, T Suresh Kumar and R Santhi.<br /><br />Actor-politician Vijayakant, who made his Assembly debut in 2006 as the then lone DMDK MLA, became Opposition Leader after the 2011 elections, when his party bagged 29 seats.<br /><br />The party's senior leader and former Alandur MLA Panrutty S Ramachandran had resigned in 2014 before joining AIADMK, bringing down DMDK's strength to 28.<br /><br />Though he had joined hands with the ruling AIADMK for the 2011 elections, Vijayakant had later walked out of the alliance after a spat with Chief Minister J Jayalalithaa on the floor of the Assembly.</div><div><br />The latest development comes as the state prepares for Assembly polls later this year. DMDK is being wooed by the DMK-Congress combine, BJP and the four-party bloc, People's Welfare Front (PWF), for striking an electoral pact. <br /></div></div>