Amid the ongoing feud in Pattali Makkal Katchi (PMK, ally of NDA) between father and son, MP Anbumani Ramadoss met his father and party founder S Ramadoss at their ancestral residence on Thursday but no truce seems to have been called. However, after Anbumani left, RSS ideologue S Gurumurthy and sidelined AIADMK leader and former Chennai mayor Saidai Duraisamy met senior Ramadoss.

“I came to meet my friend. I did not come on behalf of the BJP,” Gurumurthy with Duraisamy next to him told reporters outside Ramadoss’ residence (in Villupuram district). When asked what transpired at the meeting that went on for three hours and why they went in after Anbumani left, Gurumurthy said, “We are friends. We had a lot to talk about. I didn’t even know that Anbumani had come here.” However, Anbumani did not speak to reporters after his meeting.

The meetings come amid reports that Union home minister Amit Shah is set to visit Tamil Nadu’s Madurai on June 8.

PMK is an influential party in Tamil Nadu with a 5% core vote bank from the Vanniyar community. Over the decades, PMK has swung between the DMK and AIADMK.

On May 29, senior Ramadoss told reporters that he regretted making Anbumani a Union minister (in the UPA-I government) when he was only 35-year-old. He also said that though he wanted to align with the AIADMK, Anbumani and his wife convinced him to stay with the BJP.

To be clear, Ramadoss was only confirming on record what has been known off the record ever since the AIADMK left the BJP in 2023 before patching up this April. After the split, those in the NDA including PMK stayed with the BJP with only the DMDK (Desiya Murpokku Dravida Kazhagam) taking the AIADMK’s side.

According to Ramadoss, the PMK and AIADMK are natural allies and said that they would have won 10 seats together in the 2024 Lok Sabha polls which was swept by the ruling DMK-led coalition. His opinion on the alliance doesn’t make much of a difference with the AIADMK and BJP having patched up.

On April 11, the 85-year-old patriarch took over the party from his son and successor Anbumani. The father made himself president of the PMK once again and announced that Anbumani would be its working president on the day Union home minister Amit Shah arrived in Chennai.

On the following day, Shah announced that the BJP and AIADMK have patched up after 19 months and will fight the 2026 elections together. “He (Ramadoss) wants Anbumani to remain the working president and abide by his decisions,” the PMK leader quoted above said.

Anbumani then challenged his father asserting that he continues to be the party chief since he was elected by PMK’s general council. Anbumani’s Rajya Sabha tenure ends in July and his seat is among the six seats in Tamil Nadu for which biennial elections will be held.

Senior Ramadoss accused his son of threatening PMK officer bearers against attending his meeting in which only 13 out of 220 party office bearers turned up on May 16.

Ramadoss and Anbumani have been sparring publicly since December 2024. Anbumani had objected to Ramadoss’ decision to appoint his nephew, P Mukundan as the youth wing chief of PMK.