AIADMK to go solo in Puducherry; releases list of candidates

Puducherry, Apr 4: Coming out clear on its intent to go it alone in Puducherry, AIADMK on Monday released its candidates list for all the 30 constituencies for the May 16 assembly polls in the Union Territory.

With this, the All India Anna Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (AIADMK), currently in power in Tamil Nadu, becomes the first political party to come up with its list of candidates for Puducherry assembly polls.

All five sitting legislators of the party -- A Anbalagan, P Purushothaman, A Baskar, Om Sakthi Segar and L Periyasamy-- have been renominated without any change in their constituencies.

Those who recently joined AIADMK after quitting either Congress or ruling AINRC have also been fielded as nominees.

For instance, estranged Congress leader and former Health Minister of Puducherry, P Kannan who joined the AIADMK on February 14 is the party candidate from Rajbhavan constituency, situated in the heart of the town.

V M C Sivakumar, an Independent member representing Neravy T R Pattinam, who joined the AIADMK yesterday, has been fielded as party nominee in the same constituency.

Vayyapuri Manikandan, a close confidant of the Puducherry chief Minister N Rangasamy, had quit AINRC and joined AIADMK yesterday and is the party nominee in Muthialpet constituency.

Former legislators Dr M A S Subramanian (BJP) and K Natarajan (AINRC) who joined AIADMK recently are the nominees in Ariyankuppam and Mangalam constituencies, respectively.

AINRC founded by Rangasamy in February 2011, after he broke away from Congress had contested the previous assembly polls in alliance with the AIADMK.

AINRC emerged victorious in 15 out of 17 seats it contested, while AIADMK, its poll ally then, bagged five segments (all from Puducherry region) out of 10 seats.

When Rangasamy formed the ministry in May 2011, he, however, ditched AIADMK and after registering the support of the Independent member Sivakumar he formed the government.

The alliance between AINRC and AIADMK resurfaced during Rajya Sabha poll and AIADMK nominee N Gokulakrishnan was elected unopposed to the Upper House in September last year.

But this arrangement was virtually limited to Rajya Sabha poll only as there had been lack of attempts on the part of AINRC to work out alliance with AIADMK for assembly polls.

Party general secretary and Tamil Nadu Chief Minister Jayalalithaa had released the list at Chennai today.

She had also released the list of 227 candidates for the Tamil Nadu assembly polls. Jayalalithaa is all set to seek re-election from her R K Nagar constituency in Chennai.

PTI