Ruckus at film producers council meet led by Vishal

A meeting of the Tamil Film Producers Council here today witnessed noisy scenes with a section demanding resignation of its President Vishal, who made a vain bid to enter the RK Nagar byelection fray, accusing him of not taking up the cause of producers.

The Annual General Meeting, primarily convened to amend its bye-laws related to membership of the council, abruptly ended after accusations and counters between the chair and the section of members, one of the producers who attended the meeting said.

Vishal attempted to contest the December 21 byelection to the RK Nagar assembly constituency amid opposition from a section of the film producers.
 

His nomination was rejected days ago by the Returning Officer on the ground that it lacked 10 valid proposers.

As soon as the council meet began today, a section of the members demanded Vishal's resignation, saying he was not working for fulfilling the promises made by him at the time of his election as the chief of the body.

They opposed him taking up discussion on some issues which they felt was not important, film producer Cheran said.

"They demanded his resignation and Vishal said he will not do it and soon argument and counter arguments ensued and national anthem was played suddenly and Vishal exited," he told PTI.

Cheran, who had come out against Vishal contesting the bypoll, said he had no role in the arguments. A section of producers who had felt that Vishal's bid to contest polls was wrong opposed him, he claimed.

The Madras High Court had on December 7 restrained the producers council from declaring the result on the proposal to amend its bye-laws without the permission of the court.

The proposal was to introduce a rule that only those who had produced and released at least three movies would be permitted to be on the rolls of the body and have the right to vote in the elections.

Passing interim orders on a batch of suits challenging the proposed amendment, Justice C V Karthikeyan also named former High Court judge R S Ramanathan as an observer for the AGM.