Tamil Nadu will elect a new government on April 23.
Will the DMK retain power? Can the AIADMK spring a surprise? And what about Vijay's TVK?
A Ganesh Nadar surveys the election landscape a day after the Election Commission announced the poll schedule.
The Tamil Nadu assembly elections are due by May and the political atmosphere is heating up along with the summer.
Key Points
- All the DMK's allies want to contest more seats than the last election.
- Edapaddi K Palaniswami accommodates the BJP, will it cost the AIADMK minority votes?
- Vijay has been attracting huge crowds wherever he goes. Nobody knows whether this will convert to votes.
The battle in Tamil Nadu is basically between two contenders: Chief Minister Muthuvel Karunanidhi Stalin, leader of the ruling Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam, and Edappadi K Palaniswami or EPS, a former chief minister who leads the Opposition All India Anna DMK.
Stalin has been on an inaugurating trip of late, throwing open bridges, school buildings, hospitals, libraries and also laying foundation stones for projects that he can take forward only if he wins the ensuing elections.
Stalin's son, Deputy Chief Minister Udhayanidhi Stalin, has also been highly visible in recent months.
M Karunanidhi, the late chief minister and DMK head, had kept his son Stalin working under him for close to 40 years before he was made deputy chief minister. Stalin on the other hand brought his son in at the very first opportunity.
Udhayanidhi entered politics and was soon declared head of the DMK's youth wing. He next became a MLA, then sports and youth minister and then deputy chief minister -- all within a few years.
Udhayanidhi's entry brought in the accusation of one family rule against the DMK which was parroted by every Opposition leader from every platform. Replying to this accusation DMK spokesperson T K S Elangovan had told me last year, "The leader is chosen by the party cadre for their ability to lead the party to victory in elections, and Stalin has proven very capable as you have seen."
Since the passing of the charismatic AIADMK leader J Jayalalithaa on December, 5, 2016, Stalin has led the DMK to victory in two Lok Sabha elections and one assembly election.
He is known as a hardworking administrator and also has a knack for taking seniors in the party along with him. He is known to consult them regularly, at the same time making it clear that he will take the final decision.
Every poster showing Stalin in Tamil Nadu also has Udhayanidhi on it. He might have convinced his party to make his son his heir, but we still don't know whether the people of Tamil Nadu will give him the same respect they give Stalin.
Another problem Stalin had to deal with was his lead ally, the Indian National Congress. They have been together for the past few elections and have worked well as a team. The only problem now is that the Congress wants a share in the government.
This demand was not made earlier but now that the Congress has been out of power at the Centre for more than a decade, they have developed a hunger for power at least in the state.
All the DMK's allies want to contest more seats than the last election. This time there is one more party, the late Vijayakanth's Desiya Murpokku Dravida Kazhagam, in the alliance. But this will not pose a problem for Stalin as he is a shrewd negotiator and has learnt from the best.
Though EPS lost the 2021 assembly elections to Stalin he did not fare very badly either. Under his leadership the AIADMK won 65 seats. Like Stalin he is known to be a hardworking administrator but unlike Stalin he has his own party leaders challenging him regularly.
Since Jayalalithaa's confidante V Sasikala asked O Panneerselvam to step down and made EPS the chief minister in 2017, he has faced regular upheavals.
First it was OPS who started a Dharma Yudham against him, then it was Sasikala's nephew T T V Dinakaran, followed by Sasikala. The most recent was K A Sengottaiyan, a senior AIADMK leader, who has since joined Vijay's TVK party.
For all those who opposed him, EPS has the same remedy. He simply threw them out of the party.
The AIADMK's biggest ally in this election is the Bharatiya Janata Party. The BJP's Amit Shah loses no opportunity to declare that the next government in Tamil Nadu will be an NDA one. Then EPS and the rest of the AIADMK spend the next one month declaring that they will not share power with anyone.
Vijay, The Distruptor
Apart from power sharing, another important difference between these two allies is that the BJP wants all the estranged leaders to be admitted back into the AIADMK and when EPS refuses, they admit the same leaders into the NDA. This will certainly cause friction during the actual election when the cadres have to work together.
Apart from these two contenders the biggest disruptor in this election will be actor Vijay. He has been attracting huge crowds wherever he goes. Nobody knows whether this will convert to votes.
The more important point is not whether he will get votes, but whose votes will he get? Will it be the minorities vote that normally goes to the DMK, or the anti-incumbency vote that will normally go to the AIADMK?
The answer to this question will determine the outcome of the election. There are many parties in both alliances that will make a difference to the vote tally, but more on that later.
