State education minister's car pelted with stones in PMK stronghold

Dharmapuri: A group of Vanniyars petlted stones at Tamil Nadu higher education minister P Palaniappan's car in Dharmapuri district on Sunday. The incident took place when he was trying to enter a village, a PMK stronghold, as part of his election campaign.
The Bommidi police said P Palaniappan was campaigning throughout the day. When he was trying to enter Mottankuruchi panchayat, near Nathamedu, a group of people led by K Nanjappan, panchayat president of Mottankuruchi panchayat, waylaid the state minister's car and his supporters vehicles.
"Residents had warned Palaniappan and his supporters from entering the village, but they did not pay heed to their warning and continued with their poll campaign," Bommidi police said.
Nanjappan, a PMK leader, along with the other villagers started felling trees and stopped Palaniappan's car and other vehicles from exiting the village. They also placed boulders on the roads so that AIADMK party workers could not enter the village.
Villagers started pelting stones at Palaniappan and his supporters, when they tried to get out from their cars. "No one was injured in the attack, but windshields of four cars were damaged in the attack," police said.
However, Palaniappan continued his campaign. "The villagers in Mottankuruchi behaved very rudely with the state minister and his supporters," said an AIADMK functionary, who was there at the time of the attack.
Talking to TOI, he further said that the Mottankuruchi panchayat is populated with Vanniyars. "The panchayat has more than 5,000 Vanniyars and about 90% of them support PMK," he said.
Mottankuruchi panchayat villagers said that Palaniappan did not do anything for their panchayat in the past five years. "He made many promises, but fulfilled none of them," said K Suresh, one of the villagers.