I won’t resign from Rajya Sabha: Expelled AIADMK MP Sasikala Pushpa

Expelled AIADMK legislator Sasikala Pushpa, who along with her family members is facing allegations of sexual harassment by her two domestic aides, said on Monday she will not step down from her Rajya Sabha post.

Pushpa was expelled from the AIADMK earlier in August after an altercation with rival DMK MP Tiruchi Siva at the Delhi airport, with the party officially saying she was dismissed for bringing it “into ill-repute.”

She has since consistently alleged that she was forced to resign from the party and has been receiving threats to resign.

Read: ‘My leader slapped me’: Expelled AIADMK MP breaks down in Rajya Sabha

“There is no question of me resigning from the Rajya Sabha,” Pushpa told reporters at Chennai airport before leaving for Madurai.

Pushpa will appear before the Madras high court’s Madurai bench to face allegations of fraud. The court had directed her to appear before it on Monday to explain how she signed a petition in Madurai on August 17 authorising her lawyer to argue on her behalf after police claimed that the Rajya Sabha MP had not entered the state.

She will also file an anticipatory bail application after Thoothukudi police filed a case against the former MP and husband and son for alleged sexual abuse of their domestic helps.

On August 11, the Delhi high court asked the Tamil Nadu government not to take any action until August 22 against the MP, her husband, and their son in the case. The Supreme Court also granted her protection for six weeks on August 26, saying that she “is a Rajya Sabha MP, and will not run away.”

Pushpa broke down on live television inside Parliament and accused AIADMK chief J Jayalalithaa of slapping her two days after she slapped the DMK MP.

Read: Expelled AIADMK MP Sasikala, kin booked for ‘harassing’ domestic helps

She is one of the few prominent women leaders in the AIADMK and was nominated by the CM to stand for Rajya Sabha elections in 2014 -- the conclusion, many thought, to her meteoric rise through the party ranks.

This is not the first time that the two have been at loggerheads: Jayalalithaa had removed Pushpa as the president of party’s women’s wing as well as forced her to step down as deputy leader of the AIADMK’s Rajya Sabha party in January.