more-in V. Divakaran, brother of jailed AIADMK leader V.K. Sasikala, said on Tuesday that Chief Minister Edappadi K. Palaniswami has lost moral authority to hold office as 19 party MLAs had submitted letters to the Governor withdrawing their support to him. He suggested that Speaker P.Dhanapal be made the Chief Minister. “Mr. Palaniswami should have resigned. Under the circumstances, the reconstitution of the cabinet is, therefore, infructuous. The Governor must not have conducted the swearing-in ceremony and, instead, ought to have convened the Assembly for a floor test of the government’s strength,” Mr. Divakaran told media persons at his residence in Sundarakottai near Mannargudi. There has been a setback in the State in the absence of a permanent Governor in a situation of political instability, he added. Citing the statement of the Leader of the Opposition M.K. Stalin that the present dispensation has lost majority in the House, Mr. Divakaran sought to extend an olive branch by stating that the stability of the government will be guaranteed if Assembly Speaker P. Dhanapal is made the Chief Minister and a new cabinet consisting of new ministers without corruption charges is sworn in. Mr. Dhanapal, who had been an MLA four times, had proved his capability and was the apt person for the Chief Minister’s post, he felt. Mr. Divakaran’s condition for reconciliation was that there should be no place in the new cabinet for the present Chief Minister Edappadi K. Palaniswami and Deputy Chief Minister O. Panneerselvam. Alleges corruption Maintaining that the expulsion of Rajya Sabha MP R. Vaithilingam from the party by Mr. Dhinakaran was justified, Mr. Divakaran claimed that he had been receiving information on corruption by former Housing Minister and present Rajya Sabha MP R.Vaithilingam and other ministers. A few ministers such as K.A. Sengottaiyan and Sellur Raju were functioning well. Borrowings by the government at the time of hospitalisation of late Chief Minister Jayalalithaa must be probed, Mr. Divakaran said.

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