AIADMK 'two leaves' symbol row: EC to hear arguments on Tuesday

EC will hear arguments in connection with AIADMK `two leaves` symbol case on Tuesday.

New Delhi: The Election Commission will hear arguments in connection with the All India Anna Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (AIADMK) `two leaves` symbol case on Tuesday.

"Their arguments, our arguments on behalf of Mr EPS (Edappadi K Palaniswami), Deputy Chief Minister O Panneerselvam and the whole party will now take place on Wednesday at 4 o`clock," Palaniswami`s advocate, Mukul Rohatgi, told the media on Monday.

He further said that the faction led by EPS was in a hurry to de-freeze the symbol.

"So between Wednesday and Thursday we will finish the case and expect the commission to give its order at the earliest," he added, as per ANI.

Meanwhile, during the sixth hearing in the AIADMK symbol case at the Election Commission on Monday today, faction's counsel and Congress leader Abhishek Singhvi also said Sasikala's elevation was initially supported by both K Palaniswamy and O Panneerselvam camps but they concealed this fact from the poll body.

"Singhvi argued how a resolution passed on December 29, 2016, elevating VK Sasikala to general secretaryship was deliberately concealed before the EC by the EPS-OPS factions," Sasikala's nephew TTV Dhinakaran's counsel Raja Senthoor Pandian told reporters after the hearing, as per PTI.

In an interim order in March this year, the commission had barred the then rivals - Palaniswami and Panneerselvam - from using the party's name or its 'two leaves' symbol in the RK Nagar Assembly bypoll necessitated due to the demise of sitting lawmaker J Jayalalithaa.

The bypoll, for which the AIADMK had fielded Dhinakaran, was later cancelled due to alleged bribing of voters and is yet to take place.

Prior to the merger, the two factions had staked claim over the symbol. Palaniswami was then a Sasikala loyalist.

The poll panel had, however, frozen the symbol, pending a decision on their pleas.

On October 06, 2017, Panneerselvam and the Palaniswami camps, which merged recently, had staked claim over the AIADMK and its 'two leaves' election symbol before the Election Commission, claiming support of a majority of lawmakers and party cadre.

The Sasikala Natarajan camp too approached the EC seeking control over the party.

The EPS-OPS camp had told the commission at a hearing, which lasted two hours, that Sasikala and Dhinakaran, who was appointed deputy general secretary of the AIADMK by her, has been removed from the party and cannot stake claim over it or the 'two leaves' election symbol.

The EPS-OPS camp's counsel and former attorney general Mukul Rohatgi told the Commission that Dhinakaran was not even a member of the party the day chief minister J Jayalalithaa passed away on December 5 last year.

(With Agency inputs)