Tamil Nadu polls: Not too bad for DMK in Central districts

TIRUCHY: Despite the drubbing the DMK received at the hustings, the party still made a mark in Tamil Nadu’s central districts by winning 16 seats out of the 39 Assembly seats at stake, while the ruling AIADMK bagged the remaining 23 segments.

The prominent winners of the DMK are party Chief M Karunanidhi at Tiruvarur, former DMK Minister Mathivanan from Keelvelur in Nagapattinam district, former Union minister S Raghupathy of DMK from Thirumayam in Pudukkottai district, and former DMK Minister K N Nehru from Tiruchy West assembly segment.

Significantly, for Mr Karunanidhi who won the present Assembly election, defeating his nearest AIADMK rival Panneerselvam by a margin of 68,366 votes, this victory is his 13th successive electoral win since he first contested from Kulithalai in 1957.

The AIADMK housing Minister R Vaithilingam, government chief whip R Manoharan were among the prominent looses for the ruling party on Thursday from Orathanadu and Tiruchy West respectively. Former DMK minister K N Nehru by a margin of 28, 415 votes defeated Mr. Manoharan.

The prominent winners for the AIADMK in this belt include State Minister Dr Vijayabaskar from Viralaimalai in Pudukkottai district while his cabinet colleague R Kamaraj won from Nannilam in Tiruvarur district.

The Nagapattinam seat was won by AIADMK’s ally, Tamimmun Ansari, of the breakaway group of MMK. Former IAS officer and founder of the Samuga Samathuva Katchi (DMK-front) Ms. Sivakami is another prominent looser in this election, who lost at Perambalur (reserved) constituency, to AIADMK nominee Tamilselvan by a margin of 6,853 votes.

The former DMK MLA from Kunnam, S Sivasankar, who contested from Ariyalur this time, lost to AIADMK nominee Thamarai Rajendran by 2,043 votes. Kaduvetti Guru, the PMK’s hardcore leader and sitting PMK MLA Of Jayankondam, lost to AIADMK candidate K N Ramajayalingam by a margin of 22,934 votes.

Other prominent winners in Tiruchy district include Mrs Valarmathi (AIADMK- Srirangam), R Chandrasekharan (AIADMK-Manaparai), and DMK’s youth wing joint secretary, Anbil Mahesh Poyyamozhi from Tiruverumber constituency. 

DMK and allies do well in south
Bucking the general trend, the DMK-Congress alliances fared better than in previous assembly election in the southern districts. Out of 58 seats in the 9 southern distri-cts, the DMK-Congress alliance secured 27 seats with many DMK heavyweights including I Periyasamy, KKSSR Ramachandran, Thangam Thennarasu, Geetha Jeeva, Anitha R Radhakrishnan and Pooongothai Aladi Aruna retaining their seats.

AIADMK, which won 47 southern assembly seats in the previous election, managed to retain only 31 constituencies. This time the DMK front won all the 6 constituencies in Kanyakumari district; 6 of ten constituencies in Tirunelveli; 3 of 6 in Thoothukudi; 4 of 7 each in Dindigul and Virudhunagar districts; and 2 of 4 constituencies in Sivaganga district. However, AIADMK managed to retain its bastion Theni by winning all the 4 seats and 8 out of 10 in Madurai district and 3 out of 4 in Ramanathapuram.

Though the sitting AIADMK Ministers O Panneerselvam, K T Rajenthra Bhalaji, R B Udayakumar, SP Shunmuganathan, Sellur K Raju won in Bodina-yakanur, Sivakasi, Thirumangalam, Srivaikuntam and Madurai west constituencies respectively, the former Minister Natham Viswanatham, who was shifted from Natham to Anthoor to take on DMK strongman Periyasamy, was defeated.

Viswanathan, the AIADMK Dindigul district secretary, who won 4 consecutive times from his home turf of Natham also failed to help the party candidate S Shajahan to beat his rival DMK A M Andi Ambalam in the constituency.