Dinakaran Booked For Sedition For Calling EPS-OPS Combine a 'Killer Govt'

Chennai: Rebel AIADMK leader TTV Dinakaran has been booked for sedition after his supporters allegedly distributed pamphlets that said the current EK Palaniswami and O Panneerselvam government in Tamil Nadu is a "killer government".

Dinakaran and 10 members of the Sasikala camp have been charged under section 124 A of the Indian Penal Code, which carries a maximum punishment of life imprisonment.

According to the police, the FIR was registered after one KRS Saravanan filed a complaint in Annadanapatty Police Station in Salem. He said that supporters of Dinakaran had distributed some pamphlets in the city on September 29 that criticized the state government as well as the Centre.

The pamphlets, he said, carried misleading information about medical entrance examination NEET and instigated the people to protest against the government. He also alleged that when he confronted the group, they threatened him.

Apart from the sedition charge, sections 143 (Unlawful assembly), 120B (criminal conspiracy), 153 (promoting enmity), 500 (defamation), 504 (intentional insult) and 506 (2) (criminal intimidation) of the IPC have also been levelled.

Dinakaran’s loyalists P Vetrivel, one of the 18 AIADMK MLAs recently disqualified from the Tamil Nadu Assembly under the anti-defection law, and V Pugazhenthi have also been named as accused in the case, the police said.

This is the second case slapped against Dinakaran, who is engaged in a tussle for power with Palaniswami, by the state police.

Earlier, the sidelined AIADMK leader, along with Tamil actor and party functionary Senthil, had been booked for allegedly making defamatory remarks against P Kumar, the party MP from Tiruchirappalli.

The Madurai Bench of the Madras High Court had restrained the Tiruchirappalli police from arresting them. Responding to the latest case against him, Dhinakaran alleged that it was filed since his rival Palaniswami "is the police minister".

The chief minister also holds the Home portfolio, under which comes the police department. "This government is anyway going to fall. They are doing such these things since he (Palaniswami) is the police minister...Let them do what they want. The AIADMK supporters and the people are going to send them home," Dhinakaran told reporters in Chennai.