JOIN USBJP gives ticket to ex-IPS officer Annamalai; Vanathi to face-off with Kamal Haasan
Seven months after he joined the BJP in Tamil Nadu, former Karnataka-cadre IPS officer K Annamalai was on Sunday named as the party's candidate for Aravakurichi assembly constituency that will go to polls on April 6.
BJP women's wing chief Vanathi Srinivasan will face-off with actor and Makkal Needhi Maiam (MIM) chief Kamal Haasan in Coimbatore (South), and actor Khushbu Sundar will take on DMK's Dr N Ezhilan in Thousand Lights constituency in Chennai.
BJP, which will contest 20 seats in an alliance with AIADMK, announced candidates for 17 constituencies on Sunday. In a move that has invited criticism, the party gave Madurai (North) seat to Dr P Saravanan, sitting MLA from the near-by Thiruparankundram constituency, just three hours after he quit the DMK and joined the party. Khushbu Sundar is also a newcomer after jumping ship from Congress in October 2020.
While state president L Murugan will contest from Dharapuram (SC) seat, the party's controversial leader H Raja will enter the fray from Karaikudi in Sivaganga district. Besides Vanathi Srinivasan and Khushbu Sundar, the party gave a ticket to another woman, Dr D K Saraswathi from Modakurichi. The BJP also gave a ticket to former AIADMK minister Nainar Nagendran from Tirunelveli.
Vanathi Srinivasan, a prominent leader of the Tamil Nadu BJP, will be locked in an intense battle with Kamal Haasan and Mayura S Jayakumar of the Congress. The contest in Aravakurichi, from where Annamalai will make his electoral debut, will also be interesting as it is the former IPS officer's native constituency.
Annamalai, who quit service in 2019 after opting for voluntary retirement, joined the BJP in August 2020 and was appointed as one of the vice-presidents of the state unit. It is said that the former police officer, who earned the sobriquet 'Singham' for his flamboyant style of functioning, wanted to contest from his native seat.
Aravakurichi is currently represented by V Senthil Balaji, who won the seat in the by-election held in 2019 by a huge margin. Balaji, who was Transport Minister in J Jayalalithaa government, joined the DMK in 2018 after being disqualified as a legislator for owing allegiance to T T V Dhinakaran.
The constituency, which has a sizeable Muslim population, has a total of 2,13,110 voters. Since 1952, the AIADMK has won the seat 5 times, DMK won it four times, Congress 3, Muslim League once and Sudhandhira Party, and Independent candidate once each.