The poor performance of the AIADMK in eight districts in the recent elections to rural local bodies has substantially brought down its overall tally in terms of district panchayat wards, when compared to the 2011 polls.
The districts in question are: Tiruvannamalai, Thanjavur, Tiruchi, Tiruvallur, Dindigul, Ramanathapuram, Pudukottai and Nagapattinam. In these districts alone, the loss of district panchayat wards for the party was 126. Eight years ago, the AIADMK secured 473 wards in the 27 districts on its own, whereas now, it has netted only 214 wards, apart from its allies winning 28 wards.
In 2011, Tiruvannamalai was one of the two districts (the other district being Vellore) where the AIADMK’s score exceeded 30. It had captured 31 wards then, whereas this time, the party has got only nine seats. Thanjavur was another district where it bagged 27 wards during the previous elections. But this time, the figure is just 6.
In Tiruvallur, in the northern region of the State, the ruling party has managed to obtain only five seats, as against 23 in 2011. The figures for wards secured by the party this time in other districts, with the 2011 tally in brackets, are: Dindigul - 7 (22); Tiruchi – 5 (22); Pudukottai – 8 (20): Nagapattinam - 5 (17) and Ramanathapuram – 4 (15). Even in the western belt, where the AIADMK has done far better than in other regions of the State this time, the most recent performance was worse than the party’s showing in the previous elections.
For example, in Salem, the home district of Chief Minister Edappadi K. Palaniswami, the party previously made a clean sweep with 29 seats. This time, it got a majority of the wards by winning 18 of them.
A.S. Maheshwari, the party’s spokesperson, says the 2019 performance should not be compared with that of 2011, when Jayalalithaa was at the helm.
“If at all you want to make a comparison, you will have to take the party’s showing in the Lok Sabha polls into account,” she argues, adding that since then, the party has been making efforts to regain lost ground.
