Waning PM Modi wave may help DMK win assembly elections

CHENNAI: The DMK in Tamil Nadu, which is hoping to defeat the AIADMK and come to power in the next assembly elections, says the waning of a Modi wave in the state will better its chances.

The thought process within the DMK is that during the 2014 parliamentary elections when the DMK drew a blank while AIADMK swept the polls winning 37 of the 39 MP seats in the state, there was a Modi wave which worked against the DMK.

The DMK has been trying to highlight the ‘poor governance’ of the AIADMK in the state and the party states that many people had indeed wanted to vote against the state government even during the 2014 parliamentary elections. However, DMK concedes that it failed to capitalise on these votes because people preferred to vote for Modi’s leadership. The 2014 Lok Sabha elections saw AIADMK create a record by losing just two seats – one to the BJP and another to the PMK in Tamil Nadu. Analysts attributed the poor show of the DMK to poor candidate selection and inability to play the role of a constructive opposition party. After an introspection over the embarrassing loss for over a year, the DMK does agree that there were lapses, but it now believes that the Modi factor too played a role in the defeat.

Projecting a case in point, the party said that In South Chennai, the DMK lost the elections to the AIADMK candidate with a margin of about 1.35 lakh votes. (DMK secured 2.98 lakh votes while the AIADMK polled 4.34 lakh votes.) The NDA candidate in this constituency won 2.58 lakh votes.

“Most of the votes polled by the NDA candidate in South Chennai constituency were anti-AIADMK votes which would have otherwise come to the DMK but for the Modi wave in 2014,” said the DMK spokesperson TKS Elangovan. “The wave is gone now. And in our campaign for the next assembly elections, all we have to do is present to the people a report card on the absolute non-performance of the ruling AIADMK government,” Elangovan added.