BJP fields Annamalai from Coimbatore, Murugan from Nilgiris for Lok Sabha poll
Party releases first list of nine candidates; it will contest 20 seats while some of its regional partners will contest 4 seats on ‘Lotus’ symbol; it had already allotted 10 seats to the PMK
The BJP on Thursday fielded some of its prominent leaders, including State president K. Annamalai, Union Minister of State L. Murugan and former Telangana Governor Tamilisai Soundararajan, in the upcoming Lok Sabha election in Tamil Nadu. The party released its first list of nine candidates. Overall, the BJP, which is heading an alliance, will enter the fray in 20 seats in the State.
Mr. Annamalai, who undertook the ‘En Mann En Makkal Yatra’ over several months, will enter the fray from Coimbatore, a constituency where the BJP has a significant presence. He will take on the DMK’s Ganapathy P. Rajkumar and the AIADMK’s Singai G. Ramachandran, apart from the Naam Tamilar Katchi candidate. Initially, Mr. Annamalai was reluctant to contest the parliamentary election, and had set his sights on campaigning across Tamil Nadu. However, the party chose to field him in Coimbatore after also having considered him for the Karur seat. He had unsuccessfully contested the 2021 Assembly election from Aravakurichi in Karur district.
Mr. Murugan’s nomination from the Nilgiris (SC) seat, where he will take on the DMK’s former Union Minister A. Raja, came as a surprise, as he was recently renominated to the Rajya Sabha from Madhya Pradesh.
Dr. Soundararajan, who recently resigned from her gubernatorial posts in Telangana and Puducherry and rejoined the BJP, will face the electoral battle from Chennai South. She would be pitted against the DMK’s sitting MP, Thamizhachi Thangapandian, and the AIADMK’s former MP, J. Jayavardhan.
Another prominent candidate is the party’s floor leader in the Assembly and Tirunelveli MLA, Nainar Nagendran. He has been fielded from Tirunelveli. It was not immediately known if he would resign from the Assembly before contesting the Lok Sabha poll. Mr. Nagendran previously served as a Minister in the Jayalalithaa Cabinet.
The party also paved the way for former Union Minister Pon. Radhakrishnan to contest from Kanniyakumari. Earlier, there was speculation that the seat would be given to former Congress MLA from Vilavancode, S. Vijayadharani, who recently joined the BJP.
The other BJP candidates include Vinoj P. Selvam from Chennai Central and C. Narasimhan from Krishnagiri. Indhiya Jananayaka Katchi founder T.R. Parivendhar will contest from his existing seat of Perambalur, but this time on a BJP ticket. In 2014, he came third as a BJP candidate in the same constituency, but in 2019, he tasted success as a DMK nominee.
New Justice Party founder A.C. Shanmugham will contest the Vellore Lok Sabha seat on the ‘Lotus’ symbol. He unsuccessfully contested the 2014 election as a BJP candidate and the 2019 election as an AIADMK candidate.
Earlier, Mr. Annamalai said his party had completed seatsharing arrangements with its alliance partners. He said the BJP will contest 20 seats, and some of its regional alliance partners will contest four seats on the ‘Lotus’ symbol. The party also allotted three seats to G.K. Vasan’s Tamil Maanila Congress (Moopanar).
The BJP had already allotted 10 seats to the PMK and two seats to T.T.V. Dhinakaran’s AMMK.
Mr. Annamalai said the seatsharing accord for all the constituencies in the State had concluded smoothly. “All the NDA parties have come together on a common platform for change, and to give a larger mandate to Prime Minister Narendra Modi,” Mr. Annamalai said.