Chennai: The Lok Sabha polls 2024 is a litmus test for AIADMK chief Edappadi K Palaniswami as the party’s electoral performance will have a considerable bearing in improving the fortunes of the outfit two years later when the state will go for Assembly polls.
When Palaniswami, who expelled his former colleague and ex-Chief Minister O Panneerselvam from the party in 2022, it was the beginning of several other steps that followed to cement his position as the undisputed party chief and partly to prepare the AIADMK for the 2026 Assembly election.
By snapping ties with the BJP in September last year, the AIADMK expected at least a couple of DMK’s allies including the Viduthalai Chiruthaigal Katchi to join the alliance led by it.
However, that did not materialise and Palaniswami who often spoke of a “mega alliance” for the LS polls could only cobble up an alliance with Desiya Murpokku Dravida Kazhagam founded by the late actor-politician ‘Captain’ Vijayakanth and a couple of smaller outfits.
To the dismay of the AIADMK, the PMK, which fought alongside the AIADMK in 2021 Assembly polls joined hands with the BJP. Former legislator, M Thamimun Ansari-led Manithaneya Jananayaga Katchi, has extended support to the DMK front, though it was expected that MJK would support Palaniswami’s party as it had severed ties with the Saffron party.
Now, the AIADMK chief has changed his refrain from mega alliance to people’s power by asserting that DMK President and Chief Minister M K Stalin is dependent on his allies whereas his party faced the polls with people’s support and the strength they provided to the party.
“Victory is possible only with the people’s strength (support) and it is on our side,” EPS said in one of his poll rallies.
The 2024 LS polls is the first key election the AIADMK, led by Palaniswami, is facing following the expulsion of Panneerselvam and after breaking away from the BJP-led National Democratic Alliance (NDA).
Though defeated in 2021 Assembly polls after a decade in power, the AIADMK alongwith allies, including the PMK and BJP togther won an impressive 75 constituencies out of the total 234 seats in the Assembly.
Palaniswami, popularly known as EPS, has earnestly taken upon himself the task of proving that he is the true successor to party icons M G Ramachandran and ‘Amma’ J Jayalalithaa.
EPS, arguably the only star campaigner of the AIADMK, has to convincingly win a good number of seats in the Parliamentary polls for his party for his political graph to rise. Little wonder, Palaniswami faces a real test in the form of LS polls.
