Chennai: With less than two months to go for Assembly polls in Tamil Nadu, parties across the state have begun firming up poll strategies and alliances. Chief Minister Jayalalithaa's AIADMK is working on a strategy that is focused on breaking a 20-year old jinx, where both DMK and AIADMK have been denied a second term.
Like every Assembly poll in Tamil Nadu, Elections 2016 will not be short on drama. Voters are already talking about developments like the emergence of a third front comprising Vaiko's MDMK and Vijayakant's DMDK, and the reunion of old allies Congress and DMK. However, the ruling AIADMK is finalising a poll strategy that it hopes will nullify the developments.
In the phase one of the strategy, the AIADMK has decided to highlight the state's welfare initiatives under Brand Amma – from Amma canteens, Amma mineral water and Amma salt to Amma pharmacies. The idea is to piggyback on Chief Minister Jayalalithaa's pet subsidies and their rising popularity among sections of voters.
"They seem to be run reasonably efficiently, and seem to be doing whatever they were intended to do. So, to that extent, the government has succeeded in getting this part of its act together and ensuring that these schemes actually reach the people," says political analyst Sumant C Raman.
In the second phase, the AIADMK's strategy is to showcase other entries in its five-year report card, from the restoration of 24-hour power supply to the state's industries in July 2015 to netting a whopping Rs 2.42 lakh crore at 2015's TN Global Investors' Meet. They may also ride on the four per cent VAT exemption on farm equipment to the allotment of nearly Rs 6,500 crore towards agriculture in the state budget.
While the ruling AIADMK will look to play up its impressive portfolio of social schemes on the campaign trail, the principal opposition party, the DMK, has already devised strategies to counter the government's poll bugle. In fact, the DMK is likely to look to target the government on its progress in areas like infrastructure and industrial growth.
For months now, the DMK's second-in-command MK Stalin has been touring rural Tamil Nadu, hoping to understand some of the significant issues in the regions. It's this grass-root campaigning that the DMK hopes will boost the anti-incumbency factor in the state.
"Would you believe that he (Stalin) received more than one lakh complaints from the microcosm of the people he met? The civic amenities, roads, poor infrastructural facilities - these are the main things people complained about," said DMK spokesperson A Saravanan.
The other chink in AIADMK's armour is that all opposition parties hope to capitalise on the government's much-criticised failure to respond to the growing appeal for prohibition in the state. However, not one of the parties has said how a debt-ridden government could afford to get rid of its largest money-spinner, the state-owned and run TASMAC stores.
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