Adding fuel to speculation that he may be replaced as the president of the Tamil Nadu BJP, K Annamalai has said that he is not in the running to be the next state chief of the party.
BJP sources said AIADMK chief Edapaddi K Palaniswami has made Mr Annamalai’s removal a precondition for allying with the party again ahead of the Tamil Nadu Assembly elections next year. Mr Annamalai’s criticism of AIADMK leaders was also seen as a key reason for the party snapping ties with the BJP in 2023.
Replying to a question in Coimbatore on Friday, Mr Annamalai said, “I am not in the race to become the next president of the Tamil Nadu BJP”.
While the BJP hasn’t made significant electoral gains in Tamil Nadu since Mr Annamalai was appointed the chief of the state unit in 2021, the 40-year-old is credited with giving it much more visibility, which is very important in a state that has proven to be nearly impenetrable for the party.
Known for pulling no punches, the former IPS officer, engineer and MBA is one of the fiercest critics of the ruling DMK. He had captured the national spotlight when he flogged himself six times in December last year to mark the beginning of a mega protest against the DMK after a student of Chennai’s Anna University was raped.
“Anybody who understands Tamil culture will understand this. Flogging ourselves, punishing ourselves, it is part of this culture… This protest is not against a specific person or thing, it is against a continuous injustice that is happening in the state,” he had said.
Punishment Or Promotion?
BJP sources said Mr Annamalai will be told his removal will not be a punishment but part of an approach to expand the footprint of the party in the state, and that a bigger role for him in the party or the government at the Centre has not been ruled out.
Mr Annamalai’s predecessor, L Murugan, had also been made a Union minister after he was removed as the head of the Tamil Nadu unit of the BJP.
Sources said that when Mr Palaniswami met senior BJP leader and Union Home Minister Amit Shah in New Delhi last month, he insisted on Mr Annamalai’s ouster as a condition for allying with the party again. The AIADMK felt Mr Annamalai had tried to undermine its primacy in the state alliance and project the BJP and himself as the principal opposition in Tamil Nadu. The fact that he criticised several AIADMK leaders only made things worse.
Another factor that is seen as working against Mr Annamalai is that he is from the Gounder community, to which Mr Palaniswami also belongs, and the BJP may try to balance caste equations to have a better chance in the Assembly elections, as Annamalai a Chief Ministerial aspirant is being seen by the AIADMK as a direct challenger to EPS.
Mr Palaniswami is also likely to meet Prime Minister Narendra Modi during his visit to Tamil Nadu on Sunday to inaugurate the Pamban railway bridge connecting Rameswaram to the mainland. Alliance talks are expected to take place during the visit and the new BJP chief may be announced after that.