Chennai: Tamil Nadu’s opposition AIADMK will be conducting a threadbare discussion on the drubbing it faced in the Erode East bypoll during its General Council meeting on March 10.
The meeting, to be held on March 9, was deferred by a day.
All the state General Council members of the party are expected to participate in the meeting which is likely to lead to consultations for naming the party’s General Secretary. Interim General Secretary K. Palaniswami is slated to take over the post.
The AIADMK lost heavily in the Erode East by-elections with party veteran leader K.S. Thenarasu trailing the winner, Congress leader and DMK-led Secular Progressive Alliance candidate E.V.K.S. Elangovan by 66,087 votes.
Talking to IANS, political analyst and Centre For Policy and Development Studies Director, C. Rajeev said: “The DMK-led front has won a landslide in Erode East by-election. This is not the end of the AIADMK front but they have to rework their strategies and have to start afresh to win seats in 2024 Lok Sabha polls. The DMK front has an edge now.”
He said that the Gounder tag of Palaniswami has not done good for the AIADMK in the bypolls as other communities united against him and AIADMK. The Aranthiyur community, which has strong roots in the constituency and have been traditional supporters of the AIADMK, had also shifted allegiance to the DMK.
In the entire Kongu Nadu comprising of Coimbatore, Tiruppur, and Salemm the AIADMK had won handsomely during the 2021 elections. However the drubbing the party faced at the Erode East by-poll is considered as a major shift in the social voting pattern.
The Dalits and other traditional support base of the AIADMK is slowly shifting base. The Thevar community which has always been a strong base of the AIADMK has also shifted its support to DMK given the fact that three powerful leaders of the community, O. Panneerselvam, V.K. Sasikala and T.T.V. Dhinakaran are now persona non-grata for the present dispensation of the AIADMK.
Former AIADMK spokesman and legislator Kovai Selvaraj, who recently shifted allegiance to the DMK, told media persons that the AIADMK lost the charisma of both MGR and Jayalalithaa who used to be major vote catchers for the party. He also said that several senior party leaders in the Kovai belt had remained silent during electioneering and this also has led to the loss of major vote share for the party.
Sources in the AIADMK told IANS that the party would rework its strategy and prepares itself for the 2024 Lok Sabha polls in the ensuing General Council meeting on March 10. The party will try to build up new permutations and combinations and if it joins with the NTK of actor-turned-politician Seeman, the PMK of Dr S. Ramadoss, and the DMDK of Capt Vijayakanth and the BJP, it will become a formidable force in the 2024 Lok Sabha elections.
–IANS