Southernaras, who was announced as the AIADMK candidate in the Erode East assembly constituency by-election, met and congratulated the party’s interim general secretary Palaniswami at his residence. Meanwhile, BJP leader Annamalai has commented that “Southern government is a well-known candidate”.
With Erode East by-elections scheduled to be held on February 27, the AIADMK-led National Democratic Progressive Alliance’s election workshop was inaugurated there today. On the AIADMK side, election in-charge Sengottaiyan, AIADMK president Tamilmakan Usain, former ministers Natham Viswanathan, Thangamani, Ponnaiyan, Rajendra Balaji, Sellur Raju, Dindigul Srinivasan, Udayakumar, Tamaka Vidyal Shekhar, Yuvaraja and others were present.
KP Munusamy, SP Velumani, Karuppannan and KV Ramalingam were also present. Subsequently, Tennarasa was introduced as a candidate contesting on behalf of AIADMK at the event. He is a former member of the assembly on behalf of the AIADMK Palaniswami team and the secretary of MGR council of Erode city.
Speaking on the occasion, SP Velumani said, “There was a lot of competition among the candidates as to who should be fielded in this constituency, so the announcement of the candidate was delayed.” Following the candidate’s introduction, the candidate went to Salem, South, in the afternoon. There he met Edappadi Palaniswami at his Salem Highway Nagar residence and met and congratulated the Southern government in person. Former Ministers Sengottaiyan, State General Secretary Vidyal Shekhar on behalf of Ramalingam Tamil State Party, Youth Leader Yuvaraja and others also went there with him.
In this case, BJP President Annamalai met the media today. Then he said, “It is not polite to say what we discussed with the leaders in the coalition about the Erode by-election. Be patient with this. The candidate announced on behalf of this alliance (Thenarasu) is a strong and well-known candidate in the constituency to oppose the DMK alliance. I will give an answer at the appropriate time regarding the change of the name of the EPS team alliance on the part of the AIADMK,” he said. The position of BJP in this election has not been announced till now. It is expected to be known soon.
Meanwhile, the OPS side of AIADMK is going to hold a press conference today at 5 pm about which candidate they are going to field. If that announcement comes out, the election field will heat up even more.
It is to be noted that Nam Tamilar Party and DMK alliance have already announced their candidates and made the field exciting.