Meet the Tamil Nadu voter behind the change of guard every five years
In recent years, urban dwellers, Dalits, certain sections of other backward classes (OBCs), and the poor have demonstrated increased volatility in their political preferences in Tamil Nadu.
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UPDATED: April 5, 2021 21:22 IST
Tamil Nadu is set to go to polls on April 6 in a single phase (Photo Credits: India Today DIU)
Tamil Nadu traditionally votes for a challenger every five years. But if you thought the southern state’s anti-incumbent sentiment is overwhelming, you think wrong!
Data show that a swing of five per cent votes is all it takes to separate the winner from the loser in Tamil Nadu.
Key seats, rural-urban trends & other highlights: All you need to know about Tamil Nadu polls
Key seats, rural-urban trends & other highlights: All you need to know about Tamil Nadu polls
The Tamil Nadu Assembly polls will witness a direct fight between the ruling BJP and the AIADMK alliance, and the opposition coalition of the DMK and Congress.
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UPDATED: April 5, 2021 00:27 IST
Tamil Nadu is set to go to polls on April 6 in a single phase (Photo | India Today)
This will be the first election in decades when two charismatic leaders of Tamil Nadu politics J Jayalalithaa andM Karunanidhi will be missing in action. And this will also be the first election after the state bucked the long tradition of voting out the incumbent in 2016. AIADMK founder MG Ramachandran got a second term in 1984 and his political heir Jayalalithaa had the distinction of doing an encore after 32 years.
Freebies form the core of the promises made by the main parties in Tamil Nadu
Tamil Nadu, which has seen tumultuous political changes in the last five years, is set for one more round of a familiar battle in the Assembly election on April 6. Its two principal parties, the DMK and the ruling AIADMK, have stitched up pre-poll alliances and taken the lion’s share of the 234 seats to be contested. Both parties have, by and large, retained their allies of the 2019 Lok Sabha election. While the Congress, which appears to be enthused by the visits of its leader Rahul Gandhi to the State, occupies the second slot in the DMK-led alliance with 25 seats, its national-level adversary, the BJP, after aggressive posturing, has had to be content with the 20 seats allotted to it in the AIADMK-led coalition. As this is the first Assembly election after the passing of Jayalalithaa and M. Karunanidhi, the AIADMK, in power for the last 10 years, and the DMK, both shorn of charismatic leaders, have t
As disenchantment rises, voters will look for viable, alternative governance platforms
Assembly elections in Assam, West Bengal, Tamil Nadu, Kerala and the Union Territory of Puducherry will be taking place in changed circumstances. Polls will begin on March 27, with the results on May 2. Politics in these regions is not the same as it was five years ago. The BJP’s unrelenting pursuit of influence has unsettled conventional calculations in all these areas that are outside the core of the party’s traditional catchment area. In 2016, of the 824 seats in the fray, the BJP had won only 64 but it emerged as the ruling party in Assam. It hopes to retain power in Assam and win West Bengal, besides expanding its influence in Tamil Nadu and Kerala. In 2016, the BJP had won only three seats in West Bengal, but its rise was dramatic in the 2019 Lok Sabha election when it won 18 of the 42 seats and 40.64% of votes. The BJP’s performance in West Bengal will be the most eagerly watched asp
Congress leader Rahul Gandhi will hit the campaign trail on Saturday in Tamil Nadu where assembly elections are likely to be held in April-May, party state unit chief K S Azhagiri said on Wednesday.