AIADMK should talk to Amit Shah if it has doubts on coalition govt, says Annamalai

The statement comes a day after AIADMK general secretary Edappadi K Palaniswami said that his party will form the government on its own.

Chennai: Asserting that Amit Shah’s statement that his party will be part of the government if the AIADMK-led National Democratic Alliance were to win the 2026 Assembly polls, former Tamil Nadu BJP chief K Annamalai on Thursday of the Dravidian major had any doubts about the arrangement, it should them clarified from the Union Home Minister. 

Annamalai said he had no role in the formation of an alliance between AIADMK and BJP and that he was never part of the talks, but it was his duty to stand by Shah’s repeated assertions in this regard as a cadre of the saffron party.

Annamalai, who has been opposed to an alliance with the AIADMK contending that it was not in the long-term interests of the BJP, was replaced with Nainar Nagendran, a former AIADMK man, in April this year after the two parties decided to come together for an alliance. 

However, Annamalai has been consistent in his stand that the BJP should demand a share in power from the AIADMK.

He said on Thursday said he cannot say that there will be no coalition government since Shah, the “mastermind” behind the alliance, has given a clear statement in this regard. 

“I don’t have any role in the formation of the alliance. But I will have to listen to Amit Shah and stand by him. If I don’t, I don’t deserve to be a BJP cadre. Not once, not twice but our home minister has said thrice, clearly, that we will form a coalition government,” Annamalai said.

“If AIADMK has a problem with it (the statement), they should speak to him (Shah) directly and get their doubts clarified,” he added. 

Annamalai’s statement comes a day after AIADMK general secretary Edappadi K Palaniswami said that his party will form the government on its own. 

Annamalai’s statement comes in the midst of Palaniswami’s first phase of the election campaign across the western, northern, and central parts of Tamil Nadu, which has sparked a massive political row over the latter’s comments on the DMK dispensation using temple funds to construct and run colleges. 

The comments drew a sharp reaction from Chief Minister M K Stalin, who accused Palaniswami of having become the “original voice” of the BJP and even outperforming its leaders, moving from being its “dubbing voice.”

The contradictory positions have created a visible strain in the alliance, though a battery of BJP leaders led by Nagendran joined Palaniswami in Coimbatore on July 7 when he launched the first phase of his state-wide tour.

Both Dravidian majors, the DMK and the AIADMK, have been averse to forming a coalition government, though they have always contested elections in an alliance, except on rare occasions.