Truth Triumphs, Tweets Vishal After EC, Having First Cancelled, Accepts His RK Nagar Bypoll Nomination

Chennai: The Election Commission on Tuesday cited 'technical' reasons for rejecting actor Vishal Krishna's nomination as an independent candidate for the December 21 RK Nagar bypoll, but later in the day, cancelling its earlier decision, allowed him to contest from the same.

Actor Vishal had a conversation with the Zonal Officers for over two hours and his nomination was finally accepted. Election Commission had earlier said that two of the ten signatures of the actor's proposers were allegedly forged.

Drama unfolded at RK Nagar where actor Vishal staged a dharna and told mediapersons: "Shouldn't youth contest elections? Ask the Election Commission why they rejected my nomination."

Vishal had initially refused to leave the dharna site but later approached the Regional Office to seek explanation.

He also released an audio clip of a conversation with one of the proposer's family, who claimed they were threatened by the OPS camp to claim the signature was forged. The conversation revealed that the family was offered money to say so. But Vishal came out and said that he will not give up.

"Truth and justice won. Election Commission has accepted my nomination. Two proposers had initially claimed their signatures were forged but after investigation, the truth was revealed and proved that the proposers had lied. I don't know who was behind this but everything has been investigated in the right way. I will contest RK Nagar bypoll and meet people. There will be hurdles like this and I am ready to face it," Vishal told reporters.

Earlier in the day, the EC rejected Jayalalithaa's niece Deepa Jayakumar's candidature as well as she had left a few columns blank in the affidavit.

Deepa Jayakumar, said the columns that were left blank were not mandatory and she left the column empty even last time. She added that EC's move is a conspiracy against her. Speaking to CNN-News18, Deepa Jayakumar said: "It is a political vendetta against me. When I went to RK Nagar to file nomination, people were emotional when they saw me. AIADMK is sure that if I contest, their votes will be split....Last time, I was threatened and the then TTV-EPS combine also said they will throw acid on my face and added that they will see to it that my nomination gets rejected."

Deepa is all set to take the legal route. "I will take it up legally tomorrow. There is no other way. EC's explanation is not the real one. I will move the court asking for my application to be reconsidered. It is very much clear who will win the elections. They are afraid of the celebrity status of Vishal and are afraid that my candidature will affect the votes the AIADMK is going to get," Deepa added.