AIADMK chief Palaniswami accuses Vijay of horse-trading over Maduranthakam by-poll

During campaign activities for AIADMK nominee Kanitha Sampath in Maduranthakam, party general secretary Edappadi K Palaniswami accused Tamil Nadu chief minister C Joseph Vijay of using illicit money to induce MLAs to resign and trigger a by-election. He singled out former AIADMK MLA Maragatham Kumaravel, who recently joined the TVK, and TVK candidate P Sathyabama in Dharapuram as examples of betrayal. Palaniswami described the election as engineered through "horse-trading" and urged Vijay to confront the accusations directly.

He warned that the defectors acted out of greed, abandoning voters and party workers. The AIADMK leader appealed to the electorate to reject the alleged trade-off politics and to make the defectors lose their deposits. The remarks came ahead of Vijay’s planned campaign visit to the constituency the following day.