AIADMK protests against the reinstatement of officials

Madurai, July 16 (UNI) Protesting the reinstatement of officials, including the District Collector and the top police brass, transferred on the orders of the Election Commission prior to the June 26 bypoll to the Madurai West Assembly Constituency, the opposition AIADMK staged a demonstration in the city today.

Leading the massive protest, former AIADMK Minister O Panneerselvam, accompanied by party frontline leaders, criticised the DMK government for rehabilitating those officials and police officers whose partisan conduct had invited the wrath of the EC.

He alleged that these officials were either passive or have colluded with the perpetrators' violence and intimidation during the campaign for the bypoll. The demonstration, he said, was to put an end to the high handedness and excesses of M K Azhagiri, Madurai-based son of Chief Minister M Karunanidhi.

Blaming the ruling DMK for the deterioration of law and order, the former minister claimed that Tamil Nadu had remained a garden of peace under the previous Jayalalithaa government.

Terming as unprecedented the cancellation of elections to the cooperative bodies, he demanded the resignation of the Chief Minister on ethical and moral grounds.

UNI