After a big struggle, actor Vishal Krishna’s nomination to contest the December 21 by-election to the Radhakrishnan Nagar assembly constituency here was finally rejected on late Tuesday by the Returning Officer.
According to the Returning Officer, the nomination filed by Vishal (as he is popularly known) has been rejected as two of the proposers had said they had not proposed the actor’s name.
The poll body said a candidate has to be proposed by 10 persons but in the case of Vishal, only eight valid proposers have endorsed his candidature.
On the news, Vishal reacted to reporters, “Why should they be afraid of me? what do they fear for?”
“I will not leave this here. I will choose a youngster who has been nominated as an independent candidate. I will try my best to support him and make him win to serve the people of RK Nagar,” added the actor.
Earlier in the day, the poll body had rejected Vishal’s nomination forcing the actor to protest on the road. Subsequently, Vishal submitted a recorded conversation with a person named Velu, said to be relative of a woman who had proposed his candidature.
As per the phone recording, Velu told Vishal that the woman was threatened to give a letter to the poll body stating that she did not sign the nomination form.
Vishal later announced via his Twitter handle that his nomination had been accepted.
Later after meeting the Election Commission, Vishal told the media: “My nomination has been accepted. I thank the Election Commission. The Returning Officer has done what has to be done.”
“The audio recording that you all heard is true,” he told reporters.
Referring to the audio clip furnished by Vishal, the Returning Officer said the veracity of the person speaking therein could not be ascertained.
The poll body has also rejected the nomination form filed by late Tamil Nadu Chief Minister J.Jayalalithaa’s niece J.Deepa, while accepting the nomination papers filed by candidates belonging to the ruling AIADMK (E.Madhusudhanan), DMK (N.Marudhu Ganesh), the Bharatiya Janata Party (K.Nagarajan) and over 50 independents.
Deepa’s nomination papers were rejected as several columns were left blank.
A total of 145 persons had filed their nomination papers of that 72 nominations have been accepted and 73 have been rejected.
The last date for the withdrawal of the candidature is December 7.
The Radhakrishnan Nagar seat fell vacant following the death of Jayalalithaa on December 5, 2016.
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