Former Union Minister Anbumani unanimously elected PMK president

Pattali Makkal Katchi (PMK), an influential party in north Tamil Nadu, ushered in a generational change on Saturday by handing over the baton to former Union Minister Anbumani Ramadoss, son of the party’s founder S Ramadoss.

Anbumani (53) was elected unanimously as the president of the PMK at a special meeting of the party’s General Council held in Chennai after the outgoing president G K Mani, who was at the helm for 25 years, proposed the Rajya Sabha MP’s name for the top post. Anbumani is the third person to hold the post of PMK president after Mani and Prof. Dheeran.

After the announcement, Ramadoss hugged his son and exhorted the party cadre to work “tirelessly” to install PMK government under Anbumani in Tamil Nadu in 2026. “When Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) can come to power in Delhi in just two years of its launch, why can’t we rule Tamil Nadu? Our party has been here for 35 years. Why haven’t we come to power? Whose mistake is it?” Ramadoss asked his cadre.

In his acceptance speech, Anbumani said only PMK has the “qualification” to rule Tamil Nadu and vowed to change the “party’s approach” to achieve its dream of forming a government in the state.

Anbumani faces an unenviable task of steering the party which has been hit by successive electoral defeats and it is to be seen whether he makes an honest attempt to shed the Vanniyar tag that the party has acquired in three decades of its existence. Vanniyars are an influential caste in north Tamil Nadu forming the core support base of the PMK.

The former Union Health Minister, who took on the tobacco lobby courting controversies during his five-year tenure in UPA-I, will have to chart the future course of action for the party with the next elections just two years away. The party’s vote share has also shrunk over the years.

PMK, which swung like a pendulum between DMK and AIADMK for two decades, contested the 2016 assembly elections on its own only to draw a blank. It aligned with the AIADMK-BJP in the 2019 and 2021 elections – it failed to win any seats in 2019, while it emerged victorious in five Assembly seats in 2021. The party will likely go alone in 2026.

Prof. Ramu Manivannan, former Head of the Department of Politics and Public Administration, University of Madras, told DH that Anbumani’s elevation was on the expected lines as it is a “family-controlled and caste-based party.”

“He has not offered any surprises in the past. But we will have to see how he cohabitates two extreme personalities – the brashness of his father and his modern and new generation politician image. We will have to wait and see whether he pulls the party out of the caste image it has acquired,” Manivannan added.