Tamilnadu: the Vijaykanth Factor

All eyes are now on Tamilnadu and Andhra, the two crucial states that were in a way responsible for instituting a Congress lead govt. at the centre in 2004. Together the two states in 2004 have contributed 75 seats to the UPA-Left combine.

However this election is going to be different as the Congress and its allies in the two states are expected to face the heat and may infact have to concede heavily to their respective oppositions. 

Andhra has seen the rise of Chiranjeevi who is expected to cause a dent into both the existing formations' vote share. One man in Tamilnadu has already proven to be a spoiler. He is Vijaykanth of the DMDK which contested the state assembly elections in 2006 for the first time and garnered votes of upto 8% although it could only win one seat which incidentally happens to be Vijakanths'.

A new or third formation or party in any state is traditionally expected to cut into the vote share of the opposition but in 2006 Vijaykanth's exploits dealt a huge blow to the incumbent AIADMK of Jayalalitha sending them out of government. Why/how has this happened?

Traditionally the DMK and its alliance partner the PMK are very strong in northern Tamilnadu. The AIADMK is expected to do well/better in the South which unfortunately for them also happens to be Vijaykanth's main audience. His party has effectively cut into the votes of the ADMK in the south thereby giving the DMK's alliance an edge.

The voting patterns also reflect the same fact. That Vijaykanth's influence in the Northern parts of the state was minimal which was where the AIADMK did surprisingly well despite the incumbent party in polls. Here however lesser number of votes he may have got, he had dented a hole into the anti-government forces' votes which proved to be AIADMK's gain. Heres where PMK's lost badly which did not do as well as it was expected to in its strong hold, the Vanniyar community dominated districts. It should also be noted here that the anti-incumbency factor was no considered a major factor then.

So after perhaps many decades a party that lead the outgoing government in Tamilnadu put up a decent fight in the elections ending up with upto 60 seats in the assembly. Vijaykanth despite having garnered a sizable chunk of votes overall could not manage to win any seats except his own.

This time around with the incumbent DMK alliance facing a crunch time, what with the LTTE controversy, Vijaykanth's better performance could prove to be a boon to them with him eating into the anti-DMK, anti-Congress votes.

I would not be surprised to see Jayalalitha being unhappy with the results tomorrow.