Jaya to contest from Andipatti

Tamil Nadu Chief Minister J Jayalalithaa will seek re-election to the Assembly from her Andipatti constituency.

The All India Anna Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam has re-nominated most of Jayalalithaa's Cabinet colleagues for the May 8 elections. 

Amid high expectations, Jayalalithaa released the list of party candidates in which a lot of new faces, including women, were introduced.  

Jayalalithaa will be contesting the Andipatti seat, the traditional stronghold of the party in the South, for the second consecutive time.

She drubbed her opponent by polling 58.22 percentage of votes in the 2002 by-election. 

Senior party leader and State Finance Minister C Ponnaiyan did not figure in the list.

However, most of Jayalalithaa's Cabinet colleagues, including senior leaders O Panneerselvam, D Jayakumar, 'Pollachi' V Jayaraman, Valarmathi, Nainar Nagendiran, K Pandurangan and S M Velusamy, have made it to the list.  

Jayalalithaa's school friend, Bader Sayeed, who unsuccessfully contested from South Chennai in the 2004 Lok Sabha elections, has been nominated for the Triplicane constituency.

Film actor S V Sekar will contest from Mylapore in Chennai.