With Jakkaiyan, ruling camp now has majority in privileges panel

The committee at present is hearing the gutka issue against the DMK legislators for flashing the contraband in the House. The Madras High Court had directed the committee not to pass any orders in the issue until September 14.

The 17-member panel including its chair Pollachi V Jayaraman who is also the Deputy Speaker of the House, has 6 DMK legislators and one Congress MLA and 9 other ruling party MLAs of whom 3 were TTV loyalists. Post Jakkaiyan’s cross-over from the camp of sacked AIADMK deputy general secretary TTV Dinakaran, the ruling dispensation’s strength went up to 8 from 7. 

This effectively gives the ruling dispensation the numbers to adopt resolutions in the panel while recording the dissent from the Opposition members present in the panel on record. 

The two other TTV loyalists forming part of the panel are TA Elumalai (Poonamallee) and R Thangathurai (Nilakottai).

Though the rebel group was not keen on backing the DMK legislators in the issue, the power-tussle between the TTV camp and the ruling dispensation discouraged the latter from reaching out to the rebels. 

Two of the DMK MLAs – Leader of the Opposition MK Stalin and KS Ravichandran are barred from participating in the proceedings since they figure in the list of respondents in the issue.

This scenario places the combined opposition reduced to 5 from its previous 7, giving further edge to the ruling dispensation in the panel.