With the announcement of a judicial enquiry into the death of Jayalalithaa, the EPS government has met another major condition imposed by the OPS faction for merging the two groups. Its earlier demand of sidelining the Sasikala family had already been met last week.
The announcement about converting Jayalalithaa’s Poes Garden residence into a memorial is the icing on the cake. It would forever deny access to the palatial bungalow for any member of the Mannargudi family. Till she was sent to jail Sasikala used to live only at the Poes Garden residence and met party functionaries there.
Now that the two major conditions of the OPS faction has been met the merger talks gained a new urgency and the two leaders – EPS and OPS - are expected to meet by Friday. The other details of the merger like the number and identity of ministers from the OPS side to be inducted into the cabinet will be finalized after that. The new found urgency can also be attributed to the challenge thrown by Dhinakaran by his massive public meeting at Melur on Monday.
Incidentally Dhinakaran, during his speech, had challenged that he and his family members were also ready for any probe into Jayalalithaa’s death. Now he cannot complain about the probe ordered by the EPS government.
The two announcements about the judicial probe and the memorial came close on the heels of the Chief Minister’s aggressive speech on Wednesday where he had asserted that the party and government faced no threat from those trying to take control by entering through the backdoor.”People like me have risen from ordinary party workers to the present position through hard work and dedication over many decades. We did not sneak through like some others,” he had said without naming members of the Sasikala family.
“The imminent merger would take the wind out of the Dhinakaran’s sails and many among the 20 MLAs who attended his meeting would worm their way back into the EPS camp,” said political commentator Ravindran Duraiswamy.
