By-poll: EC gets tough as one arrested for money distribution and 4 officials transferred

The Chennai police on Friday arrested a man for distributing money to voters of R K Nagar constituency.

The man identified as Karunamurthy is said to belong to AIADMK Amma faction. Karunamurthy was detained for violating the model code of conduct.

The police detained him following instructions from the EC, it is learnt.

Meanwhile, acting on complaints, the poll body ordered the transfer of two police inspectors, one electoral registration officer and one assistant returning officer working in the constituency.

The Election Commission directed the state government to transfer S Ramesh Babu, inspector of police, H5 New Washermenpet police station; N Balakrishna Prabhu, inspector, H3 Tondiarpet police station; Vijayakumar, zonal officer (also electoral registration officer); and Sekar, tahsildar and assistant returning officer.

Meanwhile, with the R K Nagar byelection hardly 10 days away, political parties are optimizing their resources for their campaigns.

While the AIADMK (Amma) and DMK are dependent on ministers and MLAs, the AIADMK (Puratchithalaivi Amma) is roping in small party cadres to campaign for its candidate E Madhusudhanan.