AIADMK battle ready for civic polls, invites applications from aspirants

Chennai: Its confidence on a high after winning two assembly bypolls, the ruling AIADMK in Tamil Nadu on Sunday sounded the bugle for the civic polls, expected to be held soon, inviting applications from aspirants.

The party workers desirous of contesting the civic polls may submit applications on November 15 and 16 to the designated functionaries in their respective regions across the state, a party release here said.

Leaders and senior functionaries including party presidium chairman E Madusudanan (Chennai North), K A Sengottaiyan (suburban Erode), Pollachi V Jayaraman (suburban Tirupur) have been assigned the task of receiving the applications from aspirants in as many as 56 party districts.

The party also released a list of fee ranging from Rs 25,000 (for the post of corporation Mayor) to Rs 3,000 (ward member of panchayat union council) to be remitted by aspirants for getting the applications.

In a big morale booster, the ruling AIADMK, under the leadership of Chief Minister K Palaniswami and his deputy O Panneerselvam won bypolls to two assembly constituencies (Nanguneri and Vikravandi) recently. It has rejuvenated the party cadres after the main opposition DMK and its allies had swept 38 out of the 39 Lok Sabha seats in the state months ago, dealing a blow to AIADMK which had contested the polls in alliance with BJP and others.

Also, in bypolls held alongside the Parliamentary elections, the DMK had won 13 of the 22 assembly segments while the AIADMK managed to secure only nine seats.

The civic polls to elect over 4,400 plus councillors in urban local bodies, including corporation and municipalities, and about 8,200 town panchayat ward members are expected to be held before the year end.

As regards rural civic bodies, there are posts including that of village panchayat presidents (12,524) and ward members (99,324).

The civic polls were originally slated to be held in October 2016 but had been delayed following litigations in the Madras High Court and later in the Supreme Court over aspects including reservation of seats.