Distress in dravida land

Bereft of allies and grassroots reach, the BJP in Tamil Nadu could draw a blank

- LAKSHMI SUBRAMANIAN

ON FEBRUARY 26, a day before Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s visit to Tiruppur, the state’s political circles were abuzz. “Wait and watch,” state BJP president K. Annamalai had said earlier. “Many big shots from dravida parties will jump ship and join the BJP.”

The statement set off speculation about who the leaders were and why they were switching sides. Names of many former and incumbent AIADMK MLAs and MPs from western Tamil Nadu went around. The BJP even made arrangements for a grand induction ceremony in Coimbatore at 6pm on February 26.

Annamalai did not arrive for the event even an hour after the scheduled time. Instead, Union Minister of State L. Murugan and the BJP’s Coimbatore South MLA Vanathi Srinivasan walked in. Party leader K.P. Ramalingam soon announced, “The event is postponed. The date will be announced later.” Murugan, who had to field questions from the media, was so embarrassed at one point that he walked out.

The following day, Modi arrived in Tiruppur and said the BJP would win 400-plus seats in the Lok Sabha polls. But for the party, Tamil Nadu remains a real challenge—the best the party could hope for in the state is to forge an alliance and increase its vote share. The BJP has never won an election in Tamil Nadu on its own, and its vote share has not touched the double-digit mark.

“Why would anyone from our party join the BJP? Why would they want to quit a party with a strong vote bank and move to a party with a single-digit vote [share]? We have clearly said that we will not align with the BJP and no one from our party will defect to the BJP,” former minister and AIADMK spokesperson D. Jayakumar told THE WEEK.