Plea against AIADMK organisational polls rejected

One-liner: The Madras High Court on Tuesday dismissed as not maintainable a PIL petition challenging the organisational polls of the AIADMK, where incumbents O Panneerselvam and K Palaniswami were elected unopposed as Coordinator and Joint Coordinator, respectively.

Bench rejects plea: The first bench rejected the plea from J Jayachandran of Arsanapatti in Hosur in the state.

• The petition prayed for a direction to the Election Commission of India not to affix its seal of approval for the election of Panneerselvam and Palaniswami, both former Chief Ministers of the state

Manhandled: In his petition, Jayachandran, who was manhandled when he went to the party headquarters at Royapettah in Chennai to obtain nomination papers to contest in the elections on Dec 4, cited the ECI as the first respondent.

• He  contended the mandatory notice of a clear 21 days from the date of announcement of the election and the date of polling was not issued
• The election officers, C Ponnaiyan and Pollachi V Jayaraman, nominated by the party high command, were acting whimsically, he alleged

Petition dismissed: The bench dismissed the petition in limine (at the outset) after holding it was not maintainable. 

Source: PTI