Vijayabaskar named as Organising Secretaries of AIADMK

Tamil Nadu Health Minister C Vijayabaskar, in the eye of a political storm over the gutka scam and opposition demands for his resignation, has been named one of the Organising Secretaries of the party, a key post in the ruling AIADMK.

The residences of the minister, DGP T K Rajendran, and former Chennai police commissioner S George were among 40 places raided by CBI on September 5 in connection with the alleged sale of gutka, banned by the state government in 2013.

The raids prompted the opposition DMK, PMK and the CPI(M) to seek their resignations or the state government's intervention to sack them. Chief Minister K Palaniswami had defended his Cabinet colleague recently, saying only charges had been leveled against the minister, which could not make him guilty.

Former Assembly Speaker P H Pandian, who was among the leaders to defend Paneerselvam and take on then interim general secretary V K Sasikala (when Panneerselvam broke ranks with the party after the death of Jayalalithaa in 2016) was named the party's legal advisor.

A party release issued Friday said besides Vijaya Baskar, former Union Minister of State, Senji N Ramachandran who joined the party in 2014 and former Minister and Karur based leader A Papa Sundaram and Madurai strongman M Muthuramalingam (former MLA) were also appointed as organizing secretaries. Ramachandran was previously with the DMK and later joined MDMK when Vaiko founded it over two decades ago.

He was a Minister in the NDA government led by late Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee. Adidravidar and Backward Classes Welfare Minister V M Rajalakshmi was appointed party women's wing deputy secretary and former Minister S Abdul Raheem named as party's minorities welfare wing joint secretary.

The new appointees, including Vijayabaskar Saturday, called on Chief Minister Palaniswami and Deputy Chief Minister O Panneerselvam and took their blessings.

The appointments followed two days of high-level deliberations (Sept 13, 14) at the party headquarters, led by party coordinator and Deputy Chief Minister O Panneerselvam and co-coordinator and Chief Minister K Palaniswami.

Senior party leader K P Munusamy said the district secretaries meet would be held on September 19.