Key AMMK Leader Is All Set To Join The DMK Today
Sivakumar.B@timesgroup.com14.12.2018
Prominent AMMK leader Senthil Balaji, 43, is all set to join the DMK on Friday. He, along with his supporters, will call on DMK president M K Stalin at Anna Arivalayam and formally join the party, which he left in the year 2000.
On Thursday, Stalin held discussions with the party’s Karur district secretary Nanniyur Rajendran and Trichy district secretary K N Nehru about Balaji’s re-induction into the DMK, sources said. Starting his political career in the DMK, Balaji joined the MDMK and later the AIADMK and became transport minister in 2011. But, he lost his ministerial berth and party posts in 2015.
“Balaji along with his supporters were to meet Stalin on Thursday but his coming to Chennai has been delayed. Balaji joining the DMK will help the party as it has no strong leader in Karur district as K C Palaniswami is unwell and we also lost our party district secretary Vasuki Murugesan in an accident,” said a DMK leader, seeking anonymity.
Balaji will be the first senior AIADMK and AMMK leader to join the DMK after the death of former chief minister J Jayalalithaa. Unlike the death of M G Ramachandran when many senior AIADMK leaders rejoined DMK, there were no such desertions after Jayalalithaa’s death, though some lower level cadres joined DMK now and then.
After being elected from Karur constituency in 2006 and 2011 assembly elections on behalf of AIADMK, he contested from Aravakurichi constituency in a byelection held in November 2016, when Jayalalithaa was hospitalized, and defeated DMK candidate Palaniswami.
“The DMK has been a little weak in the Kongu belt and in the assembly elections in 2011 and 2016, the party did not perform well and Balaji joining the DMK will give us a leg up,” said the leader. There is absolute consensus in the DMK party’s district unit about his joining the party, the leader added.
SWITCHING SIDES: Senthil Balaji with T T V Dhinakaran
THE DMK HAS BEEN A LITTLE WEAK IN THE KONGU BELT,
BALAJI JOINING THE DMK WILL GIVE US A LEG UP
DMK LEADER