Tamil Nadu Assembly polls begin tomorrow: Watch out for these constituencies, candidates

The high octane campaign for the April 6 Tamil Nadu Assembly elections ended on Sunday at 7 pm, with the stage now set for the polling on April 6 which will decide whether it will a hat-trick of terms for the AIADMK or the return of DMK after a decade in opposition.

As many as 3,998 candidates, including Chief Minister K Palaniswami, his deputy O Panneerselvam, DMK President MK Stalin, AMMK founder TTV Dhinakaran, actor and Makkal Needhi Maiam founder Kamal Haasan, Naam Tamizhar Katchi leader Seeman and BJP state unit chief L Murugan are in the fray.

All you need to know about 2021 Tamil Nadu Assembly Elections

Leaders, including Palaniswami and Stalin, hit the campaign trail on the last day, even as they have been crisscrossing the state for hectic electioneering, the former in a bid to ensure a record third term, while the latter is keen to upset his rival's chances.

Over 6.28 crore eligible voters will choose 234 members of the 3,998 contesting the elections.

Ahead of the voting tomorrow, let us look at the key players in the fray to win the southern state:

1. Edappadi Palaniswami

The ruling AIADMK, steered by Chief Minister K Palaniswami, is keen to ensure the continuation of 'Amma aatchi' (Amma's rule) for an unprecedented third time.

Read | 'Son of the soil' card trumps everything else in Edappadi

Palamiswami is the Chief Minister of Tamil Nadu and took over as the CM after the death of enigmatic AIADMK leader J Jayalalithaa. He is the joint coordinator of the party with O Panneerselvam. Palaniswami will be seeking re-election from the Edappadi constituency in Salem district after polling over 85.5 per cent of the votes in the previous Assembly election. In 1998, he also voted as the Lok Sabha member from the constituency. The constituency is an AIADMK stronghold and the chief minister is expecting a landslide victory. He is being challenged by 37-year-old T Sampath Kumar. The DMK feels a local man will give a tough fight to the CM.

2. O Panneerselvam

O Panneerselvam is the Deputy Chief Minister and joint coordinator of AIADMK. He was close to the late Jayalalithaa and often functioned as the CM when Jayalalithaa was unable to head the government. He will be contesting from the Bodinayakannur constituency in the Theni district. The Deputy Chief Minister has never lost the seat since 2001 and is also expected to win the seat by a large margin. This is likely to be one of the most interesting fights this election as both OPS and Tamilselvan had the trust of late J Jayalalithaa but they never saw each other eye-to-eye.

Read | Tamil Nadu Assembly polls: Will 10.5% internal quota help AIADMK break DMK's bastion?

3. M K Stalin

M K Stalin is seeking re-election from Kolathur, a constituency he represents since 2011. DMK president M K Stalin is the son of former chief minister late M Karunanidhi. Stalin started his political career early and won for the first time from Thousand Light constituency in Chennai in 1989. After which, he transitioned to become the Mayor of Chennai and later on the Deputy Chief Minister of Tamil Nadu under his father M Karunanidhi. Stalin is currently the Leader of the Opposition and if the DMK-Congress alliance gains the majority vote in this elections, he will become the Chief Minister for the first time. AIADMK's Aadhi Rajaram, who lost to Stalin in 2001 in Thousand Lights, will take him on this time, in a different constituency.

4. Kamal Haasan

MNM leader, actor Kamal Haasan is making his electoral debut in 2021, seeking his fortunes from Coimbatore South, part of the western region often hailed as AIADMK's fortress. He is fighting the battle from Coimbatore South, from a city that has returned both AIADMK and BJP MPs in the past and his rivals are BJP women's wing leader Vanathi Srinivasan and Congress' Mayrua Jayakumar, both local faces.

Read | Tamil Nadu's freebie culture is not new, but is it sustainable?

Kamal Haasan's entry has certainly created ripples in the constituency – which has a sizeable chunk of Gounders, Naickers, Chettiars, Mukulathors, Muslims, Christians, and North Indians – where he is being primarily challenged by Vanathi Srinivasan of BJP and Congress' Mayura S Jayakumar.

5. Udhayanidhi Stalin

Tamil actor, producer and now politician Udhayanidhi Stalin is set to make his electoral debut in the 2021 Tamil Nadu Assembly elections. He will be contesting from Chepauk-Tiruvallikeni, a constituency in the heart of Chennai and one that has favoured DMK in the past. Udhayanidhi's grandfather and late DMK patriarch M Karunanidhi represented Chepauk, it was renamed as Chepauk-Thiruvallikeni in 2011 after delimitation, thrice from 1996 to 2011 before he moved to Tiruvarur, his native constituency in the fertile Cauvery Delta region. This Assembly election would be Udhayanidhi’s electoral debut.

Read | No calculated grooming: DMK's Mahesh refutes claims of identity politics, backs Udhayanidhi

6. TTV Dhinakaran

Dhinakaran, VK Sasikala’s nephew, is currently an MLA from RR Nagar in Chennai. He launched his own party Amma Makkal Munnetra Kazhagam (AMMK) after he and Sasikala were removed from AIADMK.

He is seen as a key player in the assembly polls as he is fighting both the AIADMK and the DMK and he has branded the two parties as betrayers and evil force respectively. AMMK has sealed an alliance with AIMIM and Vijayakanth’s DMDK.

Read | Tamil Nadu polls: TTV Dhinakaran banks on charisma to win Kovilpatti as he fights 'outsider' tag

Dhinakaran will not be seeking re-election from the seat but will contest from Kovilpatti against local AIADMK strongman and Cabinet Minister K Raju. CPI(M)'s K Srinivasan is the candidate from the DMK alliance.

7. L Murugan

The BJP’s Tamil Nadu unit president, L Murugan is seen as another prominent face in the elections as the party has made a marginal mark in the state. BJP is in an alliance with AIADMK and the alliance is seeking re-election in the polls.

He is contesting from the Dharapuram assembly seat.

There have been reports that BJP has been eyeing the Deputy CM post this time.

Here are the key battleground constituencies to watch out for in the Tamil Nadu Assembly elections:

Thousand Lights

This might be a battle between a popular star and a medical doctor known for his strong Dravidian ideology but BJP's Khushbu Sundar and DMK's Dr N Ezhilan have based their fight on development in the city's Thousand Lights constituency for the April 6 Assembly polls. The constituency is considered a DMK stronghold due to the presence of a large Muslim population. The Congress has fielded Mayura S Jayakumar, who was its youth wing chief in the state.

Read | Tamil Nadu Elections: Star vs doctor battle at Thousand Lights

Coimbatore South

The fight for the urban seat of Coimbatore (South) got interesting on Friday with Makkal Needhi Maiam President and actor Kamal Haasan deciding to fight from the constituency in the industrial city. Haasan, who projects himself as an alternative to the Dravidian majors, will, however, face candidates from the Congress and the BJP, not the DMK and the AIADMK. Kamal Haasan's decision to choose a seat in Coimbatore stems from the fact that his party nominee, R Mahendran, had polled over 1.4 lakh votes in the 2019 Lok Sabha elections. In this Assembly constituency, Mahendran had secured over 16 per cent of the votes polled.

Also Read | Kamal Haasan seeks win in blockbuster Coimbatore (South) battle

BJP Women's Wing chief Vanathi Srinivasan is being pitted against Kamal Haasan in the constituency. Srinivasan was an active member of ABVP whilst she was a student in Coimbatore and is a lawyer by training. She is one of the longest-serving members of the BJP in Tamil Nadu and has been a member since 1993. She contested in the 2016 Assembly election, but lost to AIADMK’s Amman K. Arjunan.

Aravakuruchi

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. 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.

Also Read | Will AIADMK retain its Kongu bastion this Tamil Nadu election?

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.

He will take on DMK's R Elango and Mohammed Hanif Saheel of MNM, and P S N Thangavel of AMMK.

Will it be a hat-trick of wins or a political upheaval in Tamil Nadu when the results are out on May 2? Only time will tell.