Panneerselvam was never loyal: Sasikala lashes out

“She did not want to continue in politics but I encouraged her. I told her that she had been pushed to the corner and needed to come to power," she said in an attempt to garner sympathy and support

Soon after the Kanchipuram police filed an affidavit in the Madras high court that AIADMK MLAs were not being forcefully held at a resort, Sasikala Natarajan addressed the media. Accusing Chief Minister Panneerselvam of not being loyal to the party, she claimed that conspiracies were being hatched as she took care of Jayalalithaa's final rites. Trying to draw parallels between Jayalalithaa's state when M G Ramachandran died and herself after Jayallaithaa's death, Sasikala said that none in the party wanted Jayalalithaa as chief minister after MGR's death.

"No minister supported Amma when MGR died. She fainted after we returned to Poes Garden and when she woke up she said she felt humiliated. She did not want to continue in politics but I encouraged her. I told her that she had been pushed to the corner and needed to come to power. I say all this so that you, the cadres, understand what is going on," she said in an attempt to garner sympathy and support.

Reiterating Panneerselvam's 'friendship' with the DMK, Sasikala said that his proximity to the opposition party disturbed her. "I wanted Amma's government to continue but the fact that Panneerselvam was too friendly with the DMK disturbed me. On the last day, when Durai Murugan said that they would stand by him, he should have refused the support. Had he done that I would have let him be chief minister," she said. She said that the party was forced to take action against Panneerselvam since he was being supported by DMK. "He pushed us to it and we did not do it by ourselves," she claimed.

Sasikala claimed that she and Jayalalithaa had braved many such incidents in the last 33 years and there was nothing that she feared. "For 33 years, Amma and I have remained strong. No matter how many men oppose I will as a woman face them. None can do anything to me as long as the cadre is with me," she said, once again playing the woman card.

OneIndia News