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Membership fall worries AIADMK

OPS seeks drastic measures to get graph turn upwards.

Chennai: The post-Jayalalithaa turbulence in the AIADMK has thrown up several challenges, such as the party split and the TTV-Chinnamma threat; but the biggest worry for the ruling party seems to be the serious erosion in the membership.

While the late Amma used to boast, at every possible opportunity, that the AIADMK “is a massive people’s movement with 1.5 crore loyal and doting members”, the ‘crucial’ meeting of district secretaries that Coordinator O. Panneerselvam and Joint-Coordinator Edappadi K. Palaniswami presided over had a sad segment in its short session of less than an hour.

Looking worried and initially hesitant, OPS told the gathering that the party membership had dropped to about 80 lakhs from the 1.5 crore after Amma’s demise. He pleaded for drastic measures—long term and short-term—to stop the downslide and to get the graph turn upwards.

A party source said there was stunned silence when OPS ended his brief but blunt confession. Thereafter, EPS spoke followed by Deputy Coordinator K. P. Munusamy. And then murmurs gave way to bolder expressions of concern and quick prescriptions for fast remedies.

“It’s true there is erosion in the membership and this was discussed”, said a district secretary, requesting anonymity. “But that is normal after the fall of a colossal, which Amma was not just to the party but the entire Tamil Nadu political arena. We discussed ways of building up the party back to its glorious heights”, he said.

Said another party senior: “Some of the members have fallen silent, dormant, after Amma’s demise. They are yet to come out of the shock, sorrow. They have not left the party and gone to others. You see, the DMK has not shown any growth in the cadre population”.

( Source : Deccan Chronicle. )
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