Chennai, Oct 21: Five rebel TMC MLAs, who had opposed the party's merger with the Congress at Madurai on Aug 14, will continue to be treated as TMC MLAs in the assembly's monsoon session, which begins its sitting on Oct 24. Disclosing this in the state assembly, speaker K Kalimuthu told reporters here today he had not taken cognisance of a letter from the leader of the erstwhile TMC legislature party S R Balasubramanian, requesting him to treat them as "unattached", as the Election Commission had frozen the name of TMC, its symbol and its flag.
Stating that the congress legislature party leader or the TNCC president should make a representation to him, he said he would take a final decision only after getting a communication from any one of them and consulting legal experts.
The five MLAs who had revolted against the party's decision to merge with the Congress were D Kumaradass, R Easwaran, M A Hakeem, S S Mani Nadar and C K Tamizharasan. (RPI), was elected on a TMC ticket.
The session is expected to be stormy as it has to discuss a bill to replace an ordinance, banning forcible conversions and the electricity board budget. The plea before the state electricity tariff authority to discontinue free power supply to farmers and to hike the tariff to various categories of consumers has drawn flak from all opposition parties.
The session was expected to last for six days, Kalimuthu said. Bureau Report