Chief Minister Edappadi K Palaniswami and Deputy Chief Minister O Panneerselvam led the strike against the Centre.
It will be the year of preparation for the electoral test in Uttar Pradesh, due in 2022. But before that, the West Bengal Assembly election will set the mood for the rest of 2021.
More than the traditional Dravidian political rivalry that's now on display, it's boiling down to father-son one-upmanship within the DMK, says N Sathiya Moorthy.
The Hindutva social media continues to present the DMK especially as anti-god, anti-Hindu and anti-Brahmin. The strategy did not work in the past, it has not worked in the present, and would not work in the future, as a massive vote-getter, asserts N Sathiya Moorthy.
The threat to Sasikala won't come from the Tamil Nadu chief minister or New Delhi, but from her 20-plus kin, reports R Rajagopalan.
Karunanidhi, 94, died at the Kauvery hospital on Tuesday following prolonged illness.
Finance Minister P T R Palanivel Thiagarajan has proclaimed his determination to set Tamil Nadu's fiscal house in order in five years, and Friday will show how he plans to go about it when he rises to present the Stalin government's maiden budget, says N Sathiya Moorthy.
Under its impact, rains will start on Sunday night and gradually increase on Monday in the northern districts of Chennai, Tiruvallur and Kancheepuram, S Balachandran, Director, Area Cyclone Warning Centre, said.
Unlike the regimes of Jayalalitha, Palaniswami and Karunanidhi, ministers are actually getting to make decisions on their own, with the unmentioned rider that they would be held responsible and accountable, observes N Sathiya Moorthy.
All India Anna Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam supremo Jayalalithaa was acquitted on Monday by the Karnataka high court in the 19-year-old disproportionate assets case, a verdict that is sure to put her back in the Tamil Nadu chief minister's seat.
The sops sanctioned by J Jayalalithaa on her first day in office could cost the exchequer up to Rs 8,000 crore annually.
The OPS camp believes Sasikala's family still calls the shot in the EPS camp.
A Ganesh Nadar captures the mood and scenes from outside the hall in Vaanagaram where Sasikala was appointed as the new party chief.
Stalin, along with senior leader K N Nehru began the fast at 9 am at Uzhavar Sandhai grounds.
The Tamil Nadu Assembly on Friday passed a bill providing internal reservation of 10.5 per cent for Vanniyars, a most backward community in government jobs and in admission to educational institutions.
'They are going to be clubbed with the Lok Sabha elections which are six months away.' 'These people who are ruling Tamil Nadu know very well that they cannot win another election.'
Expelled AIADMK leader V K Sasikala on Monday returned to Tamil Nadu to a grand reception, days after completing her four-year jail term in Bengaluru in a corruption case, amid indications of a confrontation with the ruling party which she once controlled.
Though EPS has sworn peace for now, or so it seems, his camp is said to be considering the possibility of calling an early meeting of the party's general council, to get a mandate in his favour before things went out of control. Ground-level indications are that OPS had lost his limited base, which alone had forced him to patch up with the other, reportedly at the instance of the BJP ally at the Centre, says N Sathiya Moorthy.
With both the factions pledging their support, the BJP believes that the natural corollary is for them to now merge and retain the two-leaves election symbol, a view shared by the prime minister as well.
While Rajini said the protests by the students 'should be etched in golden letters', Haasan questioned police force on the students.
It looked as if the BJP was hoping to use Rajinikanth to press their seat-bargain with the AIADMK. Now with the Rajini bait gone, the question now is not how much the BJP would settle for, but how much the AIADMK would be ready to offer, notes N Sathiya Moorthy.
The first COVID-19 vaccine shots in India were given on Saturday to nearly two lakh frontline healthcare and sanitary workers as Prime Minister Narendra Modi rolled out the world's largest inoculation drive against the pandemic that has caused 1,52,093 deaths and upended millions of lives in the country.
Without a strong regional leadership the Aam Aadmi Party in Tamil Nadu may end up as just another political party in the statem says R. Ramasubramanian
Post Jayalalithaa's death, the Tamil Nadu government is in confused state.
'It's a natural alliance and this alliance has been has been formed without compromising the core ideology of the AIADMK.'
Ahead of VK Sasikala's return to Tamil Nadu on February 8, there are some important questions facing her. One, does she carry electoral weight more now than her brainchild AMMK had in the 2019 LS polls? Two, can she retain or build upon the five per cent vote-share from that time? And finally, is there space for Sasikala to retrieve, first within the AIADMK and then across the state, says N Sathiya Moorthy.
The dinner was followed by a meeting in which nearly two dozen allies facilitated Prime Minister Modi.
Though the 2019 alliance talks, if any, are a long way off, CM Jaya's current state of health and her long hospitalisation maybe a facilitating factor for the AIADMK to consider any BJP initiative favourably at the time, says N Sathiya Moorthy.
'Going by his political conduct over the past 15 years since first becoming chief minister, he has made enough enemies among equals as friends and followers.' 'They could gang up and that could mean a lot for AIADMK politics to handle,' says N Sathiya Moorthy.
With the presidential elections over, the time has come for Prime Minister Modi to show Tamil Nadu that the state's interests are safe under him, says R Rajagopalan.
In the video, the former All India Anna Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam supremo is seen holding a glass and drinking from it, while reportedly watching TV.
The Tamil Nadu voter may not be in the mood to test new talent, not when the state and the people are going through unprecedented and unanticipated crises, of which coronavirus is only the first. All of it boils down to an election between the ruling AIADMK and the Opposition DMK next year, with small-timers, had-been parties and promised parties left on the sidelines, says N Sathiya Moorthy.
The actor met with Kerala Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan and discussed the political situation in neighbouring Tamil Nadu.
From Chief Minister EK Palaniswami to Seeman to TTV Dhinakaran to elder brother M K Azhagiri, everyone's favourite target these days seems to the DMK chief Stalin, which is good news in an election year, but that doesn't mean he is going to sweep the polls, says N Sathiya Moorthy.
Sasikala's declaration of staying away from politics does not necessarily have to mean that she was retiring for good. She is only taking time to evaluate the post-poll chances of hers before digging in again, if possible, says N Sathiya Moorthy.
Truth be acknowledged, Rajinikanth is not known for wanting to leave his comfort zone to take the politico-electoral plunge, even if it meant his becoming the chief minister of a state that has conferred Tamil cinema's superstardom on him over the past 25 years. Today, his fans belong to the younger generation all right, but their numbers are far fewer than their counterparts in the '90s. They are not devoid of personal ambitions and agendas, unlike what Rajinikanh wants them to be, if he and they were to enter politics, says N Sathiya Moorthy.
MK Stalin's ruling AIDMK rival does not thankfully face such problems as he did, but its problems could be worse if saner counsel does not prevail between now and the assembly polls, warns N Sathiya Moorthy.
If politics in Tamil Nadu, under Chief Minister J Jayalalithaa, can be compared to a complex game of chess, then she is undoubtedly the all-powerful queen while her ministers are mere pawns. If it is compared to a game of rummy, then she is the ace of cards and her ministers are simply a pack of jokers.
If either faction of the AIADMK failed to muster a floor majority, then the governor would be called upon to ask MK Stalin as the leader of the opposition if he would like to try his hand at government formation.
It is thanks to these internal differences that the much-awaited merger between the two factions has not made any headway so far, reports R Rajagopalan.
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