Ruckus in RK Nagar over "cash distribution," Rs 13 lakh seized

With just three more days to go for the by-election campaign to end, Special Chief Electoral Officer Vikram Batra, who arrived in the city amid rampant complaints of cash for votes at RK Nagar, said ‘necessary action’ would be taken after inspecting the constituency.

When asked whether the bypoll would be cancelled, he said action would be taken as per the election rules after consulting the deployed EC staff, state government officials and political leaders.

Batra arrived on a day when the opposition parties resorted to protests charging the AIADMK with distributing money with police support. They also said policemen are chasing the workers of opposition parties who hold protests complaining against money distribution of the AIADMK. However, police said they had arrested a ruling party functionary Pattaiyappan of Tiruvannamalai district and seized Rs 13 lakh from him at a physiotherapy clinic.

At Moopanar Nagar, DMK workers besieged a house of a north Indian alleging that money had been stocked in the area and is being distributed to the people. However, police who conducted a search came out only with pamphlets seeking votes for ‘Two Leaves.’ DMK functionaries charged the police with being hand in glove with the ruling party in money distribution and warned that action would be taken on those police personnel when the DMK captured power.

Reacting to the alleged distribution of money, VCK leader Thol Thirumavalavan said the candidates who distribute money should be disqualified and the by-election should not be scrapped for the same.

Dravidar Kazhagam president K Veeramani has said that RK Nagar bypoll may be cancelled due to a series of unwanted issues being executed there. He also took exceptions to Governor’s action and asked whether there has been an undeclared President’s rule in the state. Speaking to reporters on Saturday, Veeramani said that the Governor’s actions defying the objections from various parties are proving the allegations that there has been no rule by the AIADMK, but by the Governor. He said that the ministers from the state did not meet the Prime Minister or the Union Ministers with demands to declare Ochki as national disaster. But, the Governor met four union ministers in this regard. Hence, it should be made clear whether the President’s rule has been imposed or the government has become a puppet regime, he queried.

Urging his cadre to be vigilant and stop the irregularities committed by the ruling party in poll bound RK Nagar, DMK working president MK Stalin on Saturday said that the by-election shall inspire confidence, trigger regime change and illuminate gloom-ridden state. Announcing that he would hit the campaign trail in RK Nagar soon, which, he described, as his “foster child,” Stalin, in his letter to the cadre, said the DMK cadre should function with the same energy, as they did in removing 40,000 bogus voters in the constituency, to rid the state and restore democracy. Suggesting that the AIADMK regime would fall and the state would go for polls soon, the Leader of Opposition said the decision of voters of RK Nagar would be the beginning of the change that would happen in election to be held for 234 constituencies in a few months. A confident Stalin, who is yet to hit the campaign trail in the constituency, will gather support for his candidate Marudhu Ganesh in a few days.