The ruling All India Anna Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam today commenced its selection process of candidates for the Lok Sabha elections, with the issuing of application forms to aspiring candidates. At a brief function at the party headquarters in Royapettah in Chennai, Chief Minister and party joint coordinator Edappadi K Palaniswami, Deputy Chief Minister and party coordinator O Panneerselvam started the application issuing process.
Later, they had a meeting with top leaders of the party and discussed things including preparation of manifesto and forging aliance with like-minded parties. Amid speculations that the AIADMK would partner with the BJP, DMDK and PMK, senior Minister O S Manian today said an announcement on alliance would be made in 15 days. While another senior Minister and AIADMK spokesperson D Jayakumar said just because the AIADMK is receiving applications for all 40 constituencies, it does not mean the party would contest the polls alone. The AIADMK had already announced committees to hold seat sharing talks with alliance partners and to prepare manifesto for the upcoming Lok Sabha elections.
The seat sharing team will consist of veterans K P Munusamy, Vaithilingam, JCD Prabhakar and Ministers Thangamani and Velumani. While the seven-member manifesto team will consist of C Ponnaiyan, Natham Viswanathan, Minister D Jayakumar, Semmalai, Minister C V Shanmugam, Manoj Pandian and Rabi Bernard. Another seven-member team has been formed to regulate election campaign works. It has Lok Sabha Deputy Speaker M Thambidurai, Ministers Dindigul Srinivasan and K A Sengottaiyan, B Valarmathi, Gokula Indira, Venugopal and Vaigai Selvan as its members.
