Amid the Coronavirus outbreak, Tamil Nadu Chief Minister Edappadi Palaniswami has brought a huge relief to Deputy Chief Minister Panneerselvam and ten other MLAs who voted against the ADMK government in the trust vote held in the legislative assembly in 2017, when the opposition parties had demanded the house speaker to disqualify the eleven MLAs from the assembly for violating the whip issued by the ADMK party. 

The Chief Minister has informed Assembly Speaker Dhanapal that the Chief government whip hadn't issued any whip to the eleven MLAs, who dissented against the ruling camp, including Panneerselvam to support him in the trust vote and the Chief Minister further called the speaker to dismiss the petition disclosed by the MLAs asking him to disqualify eleven dissented MLAs, who later got pacified in the ruling camp. 

In his response that has come nearly after years at the high time when the state is reeling towards the pandemic, Edappadi Palaniswami stated that the Chief Government whip has issued the whip to 122 MLAs who had given letters of support, excluding the eleven, to vote in favor of the government in the trust vote and he further highlighted that the need for disqualifying these 11 MLAs under the grounds of the anti-defection law won't suit out as no whip was issued for them and they hadn't violated any whip order.

His response was made to the Speaker for the pleas filed by six ADMK MLAs who sought the directive from the speaker to disqualify Paneerselvam and ten other MLAs under the anti-defection law. The Chief Minister said that the ADMK party hasn't initiated any action against these former dissented legislators with the hope that they would express their solidarity with the party and their action of voting against the trust vote was condoned. 

The Chief Minister further stated that he met the Governor with the letters of support disclosed by 122 MLAs for whom the whip issued the order to vote in favor of the government in the trust vote that held in assembly on February 18, 2017. According to the Chief Minister, these eleven MLAs are still with the ADMK party and they are now functioning with the recognition of the Election Commission and he called the speaker to rule out the petitions seeking their disqualifications.

Echoing the Chief Minister, Pannerselvam has also informed the Speaker that he hadn't received any whip for the trust vote. According to the reports, the issue happened after the demise of then Chief Minister Jayalalithaa. Her demise had drifted the party into two camps - one led by Panneerselvam and other led by Jayalalithaa's aide Sasikala. After Sasikala was convicted in the disproportionate assets case, she nominated Edappadi Palaniswami as the Chief Minister.

Following the nomination, Edappadi Palaniswami had rolled out the trust vote in the assembly during which the then-rival camp led by Panneerselvam had voted against his government. Even though Palaniswami had formed the government with majority numbers, the opposition parties and intra-party members who dissented against Panneerselvam had urged the speaker to disqualify the eleven MLAs for voting against the government and the whip order. 

Later the rivaled duo merged together and currently leading the party and now the Chief Minister had backed Panneerselvam and urged the speaker to dismiss the pleas against the Deputy Chief Minister as he hadn't received any order from the whip to vote in favor of the government. The reports stated that the Speaker would likely to inform the Supreme court that an action has been taken on the matter. Earlier, DMK has moved to the apex court against the speaker for not disqualifying eleven MLAs and the matter is coming for the hearing on Tuesday -June 16th, 2020.