Chennai, May 26 (Representative) The main Opposition AIADMK today announced its candidates for two Rajya Sabha seats elections for which will be held on June 10. In a statement here, former Chief Ministers O. Panneerselvam, coordinator, and Edappadi K. Palaniswami, co-coordinator, announced that former Law Minister, C.Ve. Shanmugam and the party’s former Ramanathapuram district secretary R. Dharmar would be the party candidates for the two seats. While Shanmugam, also the AIADMK’s Villupuram district secretary, belongs to the Vanniyar community, Dharmar is from the Maravar sub-sect of Mukkolathors. The candidates were nominated after days of hectic discussions as several names have been doing rounds in the last couple of weeks which included former Ministers S. Semmalai, D. Jayakumar B. Valarmathi and R. Gokula Indira and former legislator J.C.D. Prabhakar.
The filing of nominations for the June 10 biennial elections to fill six Rajya Sabha seats from the Tamil Nadu Assembly that would fall vacant on June 29, began on Tuesday with the issuing of the notification. The notification was issued by State Legislative Assembly Secretary and Returning Officer K.Srinivasan. The last date for filing of nominations is May 31 and the scrutiny will take place the next day (June one). The last date for withdrawal is June three and the polling, if necessary, will be held on June 10 from 09:00 am to 04:00 pm. The Counting of votes will be taken up on June 10 and the election process shall be completed on June 13. The ruling DMK, which could easily win four of the six seats announced its candidates for three seats, while allotting the other seat to its ally, Congress.
Tamil Nadu Chief Minister and DMK President M.K.Stalin had announced that party Legal Wing Secretary R.Girirajan, Thanjavur North District Unit Secretary S.Shanmugasundaram and Namakkal East Unit District Secretary KRN RajeshKumar as the DMK candidates for the RS polls. Rajesh Kumar has been re-nominated for the second time. The DMK and its allies, which has a combined strength of 159 MLAs in the 234-member Assembly, can easily win four seats and the main Opposition AIADMK Front (75 MLAs) has enough strength to win the remaining two seats. While releasing the election schedule for 57 seats in 15 states, the Election Commission of India (ECI) said the term of office of six members –three each from the DMK and the AIADMK–elected from Tamil Nadu is due to expire on June 29.
The six members are T.K.S. Elangovan, R.S. Bharathi, K.R.N. Rajeshkumar (all DMK), A. Navaneethakrishnan, A. Vijayakumar and S.R. Balasubramoniyan (all AIADMK). AIADMK’s former allies, the PMK and the BJP, which have five and four MLAs respectively, have announced their support to the AIADMK for the RS polls. BJP State President K.Annamalai said the AIADMK is still part of the BJP-led NDA and that all the four BJP MLAs will support the AIADMK in the RS elections. PMK also said it has decided to unanimously support the AIADMK in the polls. Both The BJP and PMK had contested the recent urban Local body polls alone after facing the 2021 Assembly polls as part of the AIADMK-led Front. However, while announcing the BJP’s decision to go it alone, Annamalai had said that the AIADMK continues to be part of the NDA and the BJP’s alliance with the AIADMK will continue in the 2024 Lok Sabha polls.