This story is from September 21, 2022

Sedapatti R Muthiah, former TN assembly speaker and Union minister, dies

Sedapatti R Muthiah, former TN assembly speaker and Union minister, dies
Sedapatti R Muthiah
Former Tamil Nadu legislative assembly speaker and former Union minister Sedapatti R Muthiah died in a private hospital in Madurai on Wednesday. He was 76. One of the founding members of the AIADMK, Muthiah played a key role until 1999 when he was expelled from the party by then general secretary J Jayalalithaa.
Sedapattiar, as he was fondly known in political circles, was born in Muthappanpatti village in Madurai district on October 4, 1945.
He did MSc in Mathematics at Thiagarajar College in Madurai. His dream was to pursue engineering as academics was his chosen profession, but he moved to politics.
Muthiah joined politics as a student leader of the DMK and took part in anti-Hindi agitations. When M G Ramachandran founded the AIADMK, Muthiah along with his supporters joined the new party given the fact that MGR had major support in Madurai region.
Muthiah won from Sedapatti assembly constituency four times, including in 1977 when the AIADMK faced its first assembly election. He was made the speaker of the legislative assembly during the AIADMK’s tenure from 1991 to 1996.
He was elected as member of Parliament twice from Periyakulam constituency – in the ninth Lok Sabha and in the twelfth Lok Sabha. He served as a Union minister for surface transport in the Atal Bihari Vajpayee cabinet. A notable event during his tenure as speaker was his official action in declaring MLAs G Vishwanathan (founder-chancellor of Vellore Institute of Technology) and Azhagu Thirunavukkarasu as unattached members. The two MLAs were expelled from AIADMK in January 1994 for 'anti-party' activities.

After his expulsion from AIADMK, Muthiah kept away from politics for some time before joining the DMK and getting his first official posting in the party in 2008. He was one of the office-bearers of the DMK electoral wing.
Chief minister M K Stalin, who visited Muthiah in hospital during his recent visit to Madurai, condoled Muthiah’s death. Stalin recalled that Muthiah joined the DMK in the presence of late chief minister M Karunanidhi. Tamil Nadu governor R N Ravi too extended his condolences to Muthiah’s family. Leaders of various political parties condoled his death.
When Muthiah ‘forgot’ to cast his vote…
During the 12th Lok Sabha and in the midst of much political churning, when the AIADMK withdrew support to the Atal Behari Vajpayee government, a vote of confidence on April 17, 1999 proved a turning point in Sedapatti R Muthiah’s political career. The tenure of the BJP-led alliance that won the Lok Sabha election in March 1998, ended in April 1999. In the no-trust motion, the BJP got 269 votes and the opposition polled 270. It was said then that Muthiah ‘forgot’ to cast his vote in the ballot box. It earned him the wrath of his leader and then AIADMK general secretary J Jayalalithaa, who believing Muthiah had ‘abstained’ deliberately to save the Vajpayee government, expelled him from the party.
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