Tamil Nadu MLA disqualification case verdict today

CHENNAI: The Madras High Court will pronounce the verdict in the case against disqualification of 18 lawmakers loyal to Dhinakaran at 10:30 a.m. on Thursday, confirmed a cause-list put out by the court by midnight on Wednesday.

Eighteen lawmakers presented letters to the then Governor Vidyasagar Rao pulling out their support to Edappadi K Palaniswami as Chief Minister in September last year. This followed the merger of the Palaniswami and Panneerselvam factions that were formed after the death of J Jayalalithaa and ascendency of VK Sasikala as the supremo in the AIADMK.

Speaker P Dhanapal had disqualified the 18 lawmakers for “voluntarily giving up their memberships in the party” against which the Dhinakaran faction had fought a long-drawn legal battle. The Supreme Court appointed judge Justice M Sathyanarayanan will deliver his judgment in the case against this disqualification today.


Following her imprisonment in the disqualification case, Sasikala had installed her nephew TTV Dhinakaran as the party’s Deputy General Secretary, but his relegation from the party came about in the course of the merger of the two factions. Dhinakaran had started his own political outfit The Amma Makkal Munnetra Kazhagam following his victory in the RK Nagar by election, which also saw the first lawmaker from the VK Sasikala family.

If the Madras High Court judges the disqualification as illegal, the strength of the AIADMK will come down to 112 in the Assembly, five short of he required 117 in the truncated Assembly strength owing to the deaths of M Karunanidhi and AIADMK lawmaker AK Bose. Should the judge uphold the decision of disqualification, the state will have elections for the 18 constituencies with representation for over a year.