BJP yet to decide on Third Front in Tamil Nadu

Chennai: The State BJP has called for a meeting of its top functionaries at a kalyana mandapam on Thursday apparently to finalise the allies who would be fighting the 2024 Lok Sabha polls as NDA partners in the State and the strategy to be adopted for the elections.

Presently at the crossroads after the AIADMK walked out on it, the BJP has not yet reacted to the development that had impelled it to lead a third front in the State. Its State President K Annamalai, who left for New Delhi to discuss the future course of action with the top brass, had to extend his stay as the leaders were not available for meetings as planned earlier.

Once he returns to Chennai, possibly on Tuesday night, he will expedite the process for launching the third front and also resume his ‘En Mann, En Makkal’ yatra across the State that he had launched on June 28 from Rameswaram and has completed two phases.

The party meeting on Thursday might see the BJP identifying the parties that would be its allies. As of now, eight days after its split with the AIADMK, almost all the smaller alliance partners seemed to be going along with it as NDA partners and had not shown any interest in aligning with the AIADMK.

Though the AIADMK was hopeful of drawing a few parties, there has not been any indication of that happening after the split. Only Thamimum Ansari, the general secretary of Manithaneya Jananayaga Katchi, which is a breakaway group of the Manithaneya Makkal Katchi that is an ally of the DMK, called on AIADMK general secretary Edappadi K Palaniswami and praised him for severing ties with the BJP.

So, the NDA in the State, led by the BJP, might retain the slew of allies in its fold like PMK, TMC IJK, New Justice Party and smaller outfits led by leaders like Devanathan Yadav and John Pandian, besides adding a few more like the AIADMK faction of O Panneerselvam, DMDK, TMMK and the party led by Sharat Kumar.

The BJP might also rope in V K Sasikala, something that it had always been attempting to do but was repeatedly thwarted by the AIADMK led by Edappadi K Palaniswami, with the hope that the traditional AIADMK votes would come its way.

As BJP sources said the party just wanted to win a few seats in 2024 though it might contest from a score of constituencies, leaving the rest to the alliance partners. But a section of the senior leaders feel that the party might have had a chance to win a few seats if the AIADMK had been part of the alliance and by going it alone it might not be able to make it.

However, for the State leaders of the party, particularly Annamalai, the Lok Sabha elections should be used as a barometer to test the popularity that it had gained in the last couple of years across the State so that they could plan for a bigger fight in the 2026 Assembly polls.

Also the third front could attract more small parties that want to contest the elections as the chances of getting a seat allocation was more in the third front than in the coalitions led by the AIADMK and DMK.

But the State BJP also had to decide on the election strategy to be adopted. Should the party go hammer and tongs against the AIADMK also or just confine its attack to the DMK and the Congress alone is one big question that might loom before it.

Since the AIADMK was its ally till the other day, launching a tirade against it might not sound good. But then those are the things that the party would have to sort out before launching its own front in the State.