Jaya sacks 3 ministers, six party functionaries

Tamil nadu Chief Minister and All India Dravida Munetra Kazhagam supremo J Jayalalithaa on Monday sacked three ministers and six district heads in the backdrop of her party's defeat in three Lok Sabha seats in Tamil Nadu and Puducherry.

She dismissed Minister for Revenue B V Ramanaa, Minister for Agriculture S Damodaran and Minister for Labour K T Pachamal and inducted into her ministry Agri S S Krishnamoorthy, S P Velumani and S Gokula Indira, whom she had sacked earlier in the previous ministry re-cast exercises.

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The new ministers will take oath on Tuesday, a communiqué from Raj Bhavan said.

ayalalithaa also effected changes in the portfolios of some ministers and allocated revenue department to R B Udayakumar who hitherto held youth welfare and sports development. K P Munuswamy, who now holds municipal administration and rural development, has been given the labour ministry.

S Sundararaj will be the new minister for sports and youth welfare. He now holds handlooms and textiles department. The agriculture portfolio has been allocated to Agri Krishnamoorthy, municipal administration to Velumani and handloom and textile ministry to Indira, the communique said.

Apparently incensed over the defeat of party candidates in Kanyakumari, Dharmapuri and Puducherry, Jayalalithaa, who is also the General Secretary of the party, ousted six party functionaries including Ramanaa (Tiruvallur North district secretary).

The party functionaries who faced the axe include Kanyakumari East District Secretary A Sivaselvarajan, Kanyakumari West District Secretary D John Thangam, Dharmapuri District Secretary K P Anbhazhagan, MLA, Puducherry District Secretary A Anbhazhagan, Member of Legislative Assembly, Puducherry J Jayalalithaa Peravai Secretary Om Shakti Segar.

While Kanyakumari seat was won by the Bharatiya Janata Party, its ally Pattali Makkal Katchi notched up Dharmapuri and the ruling All India N R Congress, also a National Democratic Alliance partner wrested Puducherry seat from the Congress.

Despite the AIADMK's emphatic win in 37 of the 40 seats in Tamil Nadu and Puducherry, a feat that ensured the rout of the DMK, the Congress and BJP-led six party alliance, Jayalalithaa cracked the whip apparently viewing seriously the loss of three seats and sending a message to partymen to pull up their socks for assembly elections due in two years.