Tamil Nadu Assembly speaker suspends AIADMK MLAs for a day

Tamil Nadu Assembly Speaker M Appavu on Tuesday suspended for a day AIADMK legislators owing allegiance to Leader of Opposition Edappadi K Palaniswami after they created ruckus on the floor of the House on the issue of seating arrangements for leaders expelled from the party, including O Panneerselvam.

As soon as the House convened for the day, AIADMK MLAs were on their feet demanding that the Speaker allow them to raise the issue of replacing Panneerselvam with R B Udhayakumar as the deputy leader of the AIADMK Legislature Party. They were unhappy with OPS being allowed to retain his old seat next to Palaniswami – they both don’t see eye to eye, for now.

Despite the Speaker giving them an assurance that they will be allowed to raise the issue after Question Hour, the AIADMK MLAs did not relent and continued to raise slogans. Appavu lost his cool when the Opposition legislators came into the well and ordered that the resenting MLAs be taken out of the House by marshals.

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He also announced that the legislators will be suspended for two days. However, the sentencing was reduced by a day following a suggestion from the Leader of the House, Durai Murugan. Expressing his displeasure over the ruckus created by AIADMK MLAs, Appavu said he went by rules while allotting seats for leaders of the opposition party.

“The deputy leader of the legislature party of the Opposition is not recognized in the House. Such posts are given in the party. I went by the rulebook,” he said and accused the legislators of creating the ruckus only to avoid being present in the Assembly when the anti-Hindi imposition resolution was taken up. Palaniswami, after being elected as interim general secretary in July, wrote a letter to the Speaker informing him that the party has dropped Panneerselvam from the legislature party and replaced him with Udhayakumar.

Panneerselvam and two of his supporters – R Vaithilingam and Manoj P H Pandian – were present in the House. Speaking to reporters outside the Assembly, Palaniswami accused Appavu of being “partial” towards the ruling party and against the Opposition party.

“We were not allowed to raise our issues in the Assembly,” Palaniswami said. In a statement released hours after the media interaction, he declared that AIADMK MLAs will hold a day-long fast at Valluvar Kottam in Chennai against the “murder of democracy” in the state Assembly.