Chaos at Karti Chidambaram's party meet in Sivaganga, Cong workers fight with chairs

Chaos was unleashed at a meeting of the Congress party held in Tamil Nadu's Sivaganga district after workers engaged in a scuffle during discussions over local body elections. In the visuals shared by ANI, party workers gathered inside a room were seen hurling plastic chairs at some people near the door of the hall and chasing them away. 

Congress MP from Sivaganga, Karti Chidambaram and son of former Union Minister P Chidambaram, was reportedly present at the meeting. The fight ensued between two factions of the local Congress unit after which the police took control of the situation and cleared the room.

Earlier this month,  a video had emerged on social media in which P. Chidambaram was seen arguing with a party worker over the local body election. As per reports, some Congress workers are demanding the replacement of local functionaries and leaders to strengthen the party in the district. Local body polls will be held in 28 districts in Tamil Nadu on October 9 and the votes will be counted on October 12.

Tamil Nadu gears up for local body polls

The Tamil Nadu Election Commission has already begun appointing people for the arrangement of a systemized local body election in the state and will also uphold the order to maintain a strict code of conduct throughout the elections.

The main players AIADMK, PMK, BJP, and DMK have fielded their candidates for the bypolls and the final list of candidates is expected to be ready by next week, the state EC informed on Saturday. Earlier this week, Congress announced that it will contest 9 of the 140 ward councillor posts in district panchayats and 63 of the 1,381 ward councillor posts in panchayat unions.

With days to go for the local body elections to begin, North Tamil Nadu is witnessing a heated campaign. The Pattali Makkal Katchi (PMK) has also intensified campaigning aiming to bag maximum seats in their Vanniyar dominated terrain. The Chengalpattu region will also witness a multi-cornered contest as BJP is also planning to field the candidates, with rebels also filing nominations in both the DMK and the AIADMK camp making the election a localized issue.

(With inputs from agency)