Chennai: Tension prevailed in RK Nagar on Friday when nominations were taken up for scrutiny. Applications of all major political party candidates were accepted, while 45 nominations mostly filed by independents and less known political parties were rejected. The nominations of candidates belonging to the two warring factions of the ruling AIADMK for the April 12 by-poll and all major political parties including DMK, DMDK, BJP were accepted.
The nominations of DMDK and CPI(M) candidates were also accepted. After the withdrawal of nominations, the final list of candidates is to be released on Monday. The nominations of AIADMK (Amma) candidate TTV Dhinakaran, AIADMK (Puratchi Thalaivi Amma) nominee E.Madhusudanan, DMK’s N.Maruthuganesh, BJP’s Gangai Amaran and Jayalalithaa’s niece J. Deepa were among those accepted following scrutiny of the papers by the officials on poll duty.
The rejection of nominations saw some heated exchange of words between the corporation officials and independent candidates. HMK founder Arjun Sampath also questioned the poll officials on why free symbols were not given to independents and smaller parties unlike the case of AIADMK factions. Members of Tamil Nadu Ilaignar Katchi also staged a demonstration after the nomination of their aspirant L Kameswaran rejected. Police intervened and pacified the demonstrators. Tense moments also prevailed among Deepa supporters as there were rumours on the social media that her nomination was rejected.
Till reports last came, the authorities had accepted 82 nominations after scrutinising a total of 127 applications filed by aspirants. The by-poll to the R K Nagar constituency was necessitated due to the death of the sitting member and former chief minister J. Jayalalithaa on December 5, 2016.
