No ex-parte interim order against AIADMK’s general council resolutions: HC

Judge says plea for interim relief can be considered only after ordering notices to the party and Edappadi K. Palaniswami; refrains from expressing opinion on the merits of Manoj Pandian’s case

The Madras High Court on Friday refused to pass an ex-parte interim injunction restraining the AIADMK from implementing the party’s July 11, 2022 general council resolutions through which former Chief Minister O. Panneerselvam and his three supporters were expelled and the other former Chief Minister, Edappadi K. Palaniswami, was appointed the interim general secretary.

Justice Senthilkumar Ramamoorthy made it clear that, for the present, he was not expressing any opinion on the merits of the civil suit or interim application filed by expelled leader P.H. Manoj Pandian who had challenged the validity of the resolutions. However, he refused to pass any interim order without ordering notices to the AIADMK, its general council represented by the presidium chairman and Mr. Palaniswami.

The judge permitted advocate K. Gowtham Kumar to take notices on behalf of the three defendants and asked senior counsel C.S. Vaidyanathan and Vijay Narayan to make sure that the counter-affidavits to the interim plea were served on Mr. Pandian’s counsel-on-record S. Elambharathi at least two days before the next hearing on March 17. He said the plaintiff would be at liberty to file a rejoinder before the next hearing.

The July 11 general council had passed 16 regular resolutions, apart from a special resolution. However, Mr. Pandian had challenged only resolution numbers 3, 4, 5 and 6 and the special resolution through which Mr. Panneerselvam, former Minister R. Vaithilingam, spokesperson J.C.D. Prabhakar and he were removed from the primary membership of the party on the charge of anti-party activities.

The third resolution, under challenge, was related to the abolition of the posts of coordinator and joint coordinator, held by Mr. Panneerselvam and Mr. Palaniswami respectively, and revival of the post of general secretary. The fourth was to create the post of interim general secretary and the fifth was to appoint Mr. Palaniswami to that post. The sixth resolution was related to the conduct of election to the post of general secretary within four months.

Assailing the five resolutions, senior counsel Guru Krishnakumar contended that the expulsion of Mr. Pandian and others was ex-facie illegal on three grounds.

First, they had been expelled without any notice and in violation of the principles of natural justice. Secondly, the body which expelled them was not an authorised body since only the coordinator and the joint coordinator could expel a party member. Thirdly, the general council meeting, where the special resolution was passed, did not contain any agenda related to it.

“This was some kind of a knee jerk reaction on the floor of the council. When a decision is arbitrary and unreasonable, court can certainly interfere right away,” Mr. Krishnakumar argued. However, the judge said he was not inclined to grant an ex-parte order solely because the resolutions had been passed seven months ago.

Replying to it, the senior counsel explained that there was no necessity for Mr. Pandian to file a suit last year because Mr. Panneerselvam himself had filed a suit challenging the procedures adopted to convene the July 11 general council meeting. Only recently had the Supreme Court upheld the validity of the meeting and therefore, the present suit had been filed to prevent the party from implementing the resolutions.

To this, the judge said Mr. Pandian, too, could have filed a suit last year challenging the resolutions, especially when the expulsion had come into effect from July 7 itself, and got it tagged with Mr. Panneerselvam’s suit. Mr. Krishnakumar told the judge that his client, Mr. Pandian, was an incumbent Member of the Assembly representing Alangulam, and hence there was an urgent need for interim orders.

Claiming that the plaintiff had a right to attend the Assembly as a member of the AIADMK, the senior counsel feared the party should not end up communicating the resolutions to the Speaker, besides conducting the election to the post of general secretary and then present a fait accompli before the court by taking advantage of the absence of an interim order during the pendency of the civil suit.

However, the judge said he was ordering only a short notice on the plea for interim injunction and adjourned the matter by two weeks.