Though the stakes of both the Dravidian parties are high in these elections, Jayalalithaa has a little more to lose or gain than the state's First Family, says Neerja Chowdhury
In the next two years, reveals says R Rajagopalan, Modi-Shah will make a strong effort to woo the south.
BJP veterans whom K Annamalai has reportedly sidelined are upset over his 'immature' way of handling allies, reveals N Sathiya Moorthy.
Neither emotions nor a structured approach to addressing critical issues came out in Kamal Hassan's inaugural speech on Wednesday, says N Sathiya Moorthy.
The going is not going to be easy for the DMK and its allies in Elections 2024. Despite the seats sweepstake in the 2021 assembly polls, the vote-share difference of 5.6% (DMK's 45.38% versus AIADMK-BJP's 39.72%) is not insurmountable on a bad day, points out N Sathiya Moorthy.
Many leaders from non-Hindi states, especially Tamil Nadu and Karnataka, had opposed the policy.
For the first time in recent times, rebellion was open in the monolithic AIADMK with party workers wanting change of candidates in so many places.
"Lord Ram is an imaginary character and Ram Sethu is not a man-made bridge. The Centre should not do anything to disturb the Sethusamudram project," he said.
Mamata Banerjee fended off a spirited challenge by a resurgent Bharatiya Janata Party in West Bengal with a landslide victory for her Trinamool Congress on Sunday for a third consecutive term and the saffron party and the Left Democratic Front were poised to form government again in Assam and Kerala respectively while the Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam stormed back to power in Tamil Nadu after a gap of 10 years.
'When an individual becomes authoritarian, you can overthrow the individual easily. 'When the system becomes authoritarian, whoever challenges the system will be called a criminal or an anti-national.'
Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam cadres are said to be upset over AICC general secretary Rahul Gandhi not calling on party patriarch and Chief Minister M Karunanidhi, a practice followed by Congress leaders during their visit to Tamil Nadu.
At the same time VK Sasikala, confidante of late party matriarch J Jayalalithaa is staking claim to the late leader's legacy.
Twitter users flooded the social network with messages against the move, making #StopHindiImposition and #TNAgainstHindiImposition the top trends on platform.
Cassandras and Congressis may sneer at the findings, but the Times Now poll indicated that the Modi government was very much on its way to a second term.
The jallikattu issue has revived pan-Tamil political sentiments especially among youths, says N Sathiya Moorthy.
Today, with the 'Cauvery row' in full flow, the DMK has managed to wrest the 'pan-Tamil initiative' for the Dravidian polity as a whole. What more, the DMK has also stolen much of the 'Tamil thunder' that had belonged to peripheral pan-Tamil groups over the Jallikattu protests in January 2017, says N Sathiya Moorthy.
The Congress on Thursday secured a seat in the present Bengal assembly as its candidate Bayron Biswas won the Sagardighi bypoll, defeating the nearest rival of the Trinamool Congress by 22,980 votes.
Higher education policy may be at the core of the Tamil Nadu assembly polls next May, with a potential to break the ties between the ruling AIADMK in the state and the BJP counterpart at the national level, says N Sathiya Moorthy.
At the end of the day, Stalin expressing solidarity with an arrested colleague is one thing, especially if he too felt that the minister had been wronged, but for him to retain the person in office sets a bad precedent, which would not go unnoticed by voters, points out N Sathiya Moorthy.
The RK Nagar bypoll result is a danger signal to the AIADMK government in Tamil Nadu, says R Rajagopalan.
After Rahul's Bharat Jodo Yatra began criss-crossing the Hindi heartland, BJP leaders have revived their attacks on 'dynasty politics' and 'family rule' in the Congress, points out N Sathiya Moorthy.
It is a sea of men clad in veshtis with distinctive party colour border design seeking votes with a smile and folded hands for their party candidates. The town is abuzz, with electioneering at its peak, and teeming trendy cars criss-cross the busy roads and bylanes bringing in more and more leaders from elsewhere for campaign.
Modi's non-reference could also imply that the BJP may be keeping its alliance options open vis--vis the AIADMK. It could also imply that the BJP's national leadership had not given up on the DMK returning to power in the state post-poll, and the Centre having to do business with a new government in Fort St George, says N Sathiya Moorthy.
At a time when the BJP's stars are at the top on the eve of the Lok Sabha polls, the Puri-Joshimath Sankaracharyas may have kick-started a row whose efforts might be to divide Hindus, not in the name of castes, but on what passes for greater belief, observes N Sathiya Moorthy.
'He just said that those who cannot control the violence should go. He did not name the BJP.'
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.
The AIADMK's staying power is not in question, but it has to regain the winning streak. That will require its leaders and leadership to re-wire themselves, to be able to re-think situations in ways different from what they had been accustomed to, suggests Sathiya Moorthy.
Party co-coordinator Palaniswami announced constitution of a 11-member steering committee which includes ministers Dindigul C Sreenivasan, P Thangamani, and S P Velumani.
Thursday's protests across Tamil Nadu was less pro-Cauvery and more anti-Modi in character and content -- including in it various development projects in the state that are perceived as 'environmentally unfriendly' and hence 'anti-Tamil', says N Sathiya Moorthy.
'Religion must be in your home and in the temple, not in government functions.'
Without strategising together, Jayalalithaa's successor, Chief Minister Edappadi K Palaniswami, and M Karunanidhi's son-cum-successor, M K Stalin, have used tough-talking on seat-sharing with allies, to replace charisma that they purportedly lacked, during the run-up to the assembly polls scheduled for April 6, says N Sathiya Moorthy.
Stalin, like his father M Karunanidhi did in 2004, may play the king-maker in a way -- not the king, unless the 2024 post-poll circumstances throws up a situation where he alone becomes acceptable to the rest, observes N Sathiya Moorthy.
He also launched a strident attack on Prime Minister Narendra Modi, saying he was 'globe-trotting', afraid of facing questions over the Manipur violence.
While the DMK dubbed the meeting as only a 'courtesy visit', Rao did not meet the waiting reporters.
Elections will also be held in 35 assembly constituencies in Odisha.
After a high-level party meet in Chennai, Vaiko said his party has unanimously decided to support the DMK in the by-election.
Tamil Nadu, the land of regional parties where the two Dravidian outfits have ruled the roost for long, is witnessing a few fledgling parties testing their electoral luck for the first time in the April 24 Lok Sabha elections, including Aam Aadmi Party and Indiya Jananayaka Katchi.
Neither the ruling DMK nor the fractured AIADMK Opposition anticipated that an assembly by-election would put them both to test, observes N Sathiya Moorthy.
