Chennai: MDMK general secretary Vaiko on Tuesday hailed the Madras High Court verdict upholding the party's ownership of the six-decade old mill workers association and its properties against an appeal by the DMK, ending a conflict cited as one of the major hurdle for alliance between the two parties.
When Vaiko participated in a marriage function of Karunanidhi's family in 2015, there was speculation of an alliance between the two parties. But Vaiko's request to the DMK to withdraw the prestigious case led to bitterness between them. Finally, in the 2016 Assembly elections, MDMK joined hands with DMDK and Left parties.
The ownership of the Kovai District Dravidian Cotton Mill Workers Progressive Union, which was started by the DMK under its founder C.N. Annadurai in 1958, turned into a major battle between the parent body and MDMK when the members of the DMK forcibly occupied the union headquarters in 2010. MDMK presidium chairman S. Duraisami, who was elected as the general secretary of the union in 1958, was expelled from the union by DMK members in 1993, but the expulsion was nullified by a district court in the year 2000.
However, the DMK members occupied the union headquarters in 2010, but the MDMK again filed an appeal in the Coimbatore Sessions court and got an order that the union headquarters should be handed over to them. The order was challenged by the DMK, but its appeal against the sessions court judgment was rejected by the Madras High Court, ending the two-decade old legal battle.
