The
state of
Tamil Nadu is divided into
234 assembly constituencies, each of which elects a member (called an
MLA) to represent it at the state's
unicameral legislative assembly, as per Article 168 of the
Constitution of India. The
Tamil Nadu Legislative Assembly convenes at
Fort St. George,
Chennai. The chief ministerial candidate that receives the support of the majority of MLAs, which is a minimum of 118 members, is appointed as the
Chief Minister of Tamil Nadu, who is the executive head of the
Government of Tamil Nadu. The
Governor of Tamil Nadu, the state's ceremonial head, will invite the Chief-Minister-elect and his
Council of Ministers to be sworn in, to lead the
state government for a term of the next five years. , holding a press conference in New Delhi on February 26, 2021, to announce the schedule for Legislative Assembly election of Tamil Nadu along with those of
Assam,
Kerala,
West Bengal, and
Puducherry.|260x260px Tamil Nadu's partisan politics have been dominated by its two regional
Dravidian parties,
Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (DMK) and
All India Anna Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (AIADMK), for the last 50 years (since
1967). Each recognized party in India is given a polling symbol by the
Election Commission of India, an independent and neutral body of officers that conducts and regulates all the elections in the country. The DMK contests with the
Rising Sun symbol, while the AIADMK contests with the
Two Leaves. The legislative assembly of Tamil Nadu goes to polls alongside the legislative assemblies of three other Indian states, namely
Assam,
Kerala, and
West Bengal, and that of the
union territory of
Puducherry.
Background Since the death of AIADMK founder
M.G Ramachandran (who had been in power since
1977) in 1987, DMK's
M Karunanidhi (who came into prominence in 1969 following the death of DMK founder
C.N Annadurai) & AIADMK's
J Jayalalitha heavily dominated the state's politics. DMK won the
1989,
1996 &
2006 elections while AIADMK won the
1991,
2001 &
2011 elections. In
2016, AIADMK retained its majority with 136 seats, while the DMK increased its strength to 98 seats. Jayalalitha became the second incumbent Chief minister of Tamil Nadu to be re-elected back in power since MGR's re-election in
1984. 2021's election of the sixteenth assembly election is the first state election after the deaths of Jayalalithaa and Karunanidhi, who died in 2016 and 2018 respectively.
Rise and fall of V.K. Sasikala Following Jayalalithaa's demise from
cardiac arrest on 5 December 2016,
O. Panneerselvam of the AIADMK became the Chief Minister of Tamil Nadu for the third time. The first two times he attained the post (21 September 2001 to 2 March 2002, and 28 September 2014 to 23 May 2015) was when Jayalalithaa was forcibly removed from office twice due to the lawsuit against her. He served as the Acting Chief Minister during Jayalalithaa's hospitalization in 2016. However, soon after swearing-in, Panneerselvam rebelled against the influence of
V. K. Sasikala, a long-time friend and close aide of Jayalalithaa, inside the AIADMK party, and deemed her a threat to his Chief Ministership, exposing the factionalism inside the party. In a meeting of the party's general council held on 29 December 2016, the first meeting after Jayalalithaa's death, Sasikala was appointed as the party's temporary general secretary. On 5 February 2017, all the MLAs of the AIADMK unanimously elected Sasikala as the Legislative Assembly leader of the AIADMK, making her the Chief-Minister-elect officially. On 6 February 2017, Panneerselvam submitted his resignation letter to then
Governor of Tamil Nadu,
C. Vidyasagar Rao, who accepted the resignation but instructed him to continue to functioning as Chief Minister "until alternate arrangements are made", awaiting the pending verdict of
the 18-year-long trial regarding the disproportionate assets of Jayalalithaa and Sasikala. Later Pannerselvam made mediation in Jayalalithaa's memorial on 7 February and he was coerced into resignation. He called it as "Dharmayudam". Later in the 9 February, Sasikala met the Governor and laid claims to the Chief Ministership, by submitting the list of AIADMK legislators who back her. Reports stated Sasikala had those MLAs sequestered at a resort in
South Chennai named Koovathur. On 14 February 2017, the
Supreme Court of India pronounced Sasikala and her relatives guilty of criminally conspiring, laundering and amassing illicit wealth worth about in the 1990s, and sentenced them to serve a four-year jail term at
Central Prison, Bangalore, giving the convicts 24 hours to surrender. This restored
in toto her earlier conviction in the case delivered on 27 September 2014. Proceedings against Jayalalithaa had been abated and dismissed on account of her death. The conviction effectively ended Sasikala's Chief Ministerial ambitions. Following Sasikala's conviction, the Governor rejected her claims to become the Chief Minister of Tamil Nadu. In her ticking 24-hour surrender time-limit and capacity as the general secretary of the AIADMK, Sasikala convened the party's MLAs, who unanimously elected
Edappadi K. Palaniswami, a then supporter of Sasikala, as the new Chief Minister. She also appointed her nephew and former treasurer of the party,
T. T. V. Dhinakaran, as the party's deputy general secretary. Palaniswami as sworn in as the Chief Minister of Tamil Nadu the next day, replacing Panneerselvam. On 23 March 2017, the
Election commission of India designated the two factions separately; Panneerselvam's faction known as "AIADMK (Puratchi Thalaivi Amma)", while Dhinakaran-Palaniswami's faction known as "AIADMK (Amma)". By-polls were announced at the
Dr. Radhakrishnan Nagar constituency, which was vacated due to Jayalalithaa's death. Dhinakaran was named candidate by his faction. However, the Election Commission canceled the by-polls after evidence of large-scale bribing by the ruling AIADMK (Amma) surfaced. On 17 April 2017,
Delhi Police registered a case against Dhinakaran for allegedly attempting to bribe the Election Commission into giving the AIADMK's significant
Twin Leaves symbol to his faction. Dhinakaran was granted bail on the grounds that the police failed to identify the bribed officer. In the following months, the Chief Minister had a fallout with Dhinakaran. Palaniswami pronounced Dhinakaran's appointment as deputy general secretary "invalid" on 17 August 2017, and ousted him from the party.
AIADMK under Dual Leadership On 21 August 2017, it was reported that the Paneerselvam faction of AIADMK had decided to merge back with the Palaniswami faction, under the terms that Sasikala would be expelled from the party. On 21 August 2017, both Palaniswami and Paneerselvam factions of the AIADMK reunited, with the leaders assuming co-leadership of the party. Panneerselvam sworn in as the
Deputy Chief Minister of Tamil Nadu, Finance Minister of Tamil Nadu and the coordinator of the AIADMK. Palaniswami was dubbed the joint coordinator of the party. Mainstream media and publications suspected the involvement of the
Bharatiya Janata Party, the ruling party of the
Union Government of India, in the AIADMK's merger. This marked the first time the BJP began to play an influential role in the Tamil Nadu politics, acting as the mediator that united the two factions. Dhinakaran and his supporters continued to dub themselves the "real AIADMK". On 22 August 2017, 18 MLAs of the AIADMK pledged allegiance to
Dhinakaran and submitted letters to the Governor, expressing
lack of confidence in Palaniswami and withdrawing their support to the Palaniswami-led government. Immediately, those MLAs were expelled from the AIADMK. The
Speaker of the fifteenth Tamil Nadu Legislative Assembly,
P. Dhanapal, also disqualified those MLAs from their offices, citing
the Constitution Act of 1985, which prevents the instability caused by democratically elected representatives in India's legislatures shifting allegiance from the parties they supported at the time of election, or disobeying their parties' decisions at critical times, by rendering their seats vacant. This resulted in a long legal battle, at the end of which, the
Madras High Court, the highest court of Tamil Nadu, gave a verdict in the Speaker's favour and confirmed the disqualification of the 19 legislators. Following these events, Sasikala was expelled from the party on 12 September 2017, with her position as interim general secretary disputed and abolished. Instead, the late Jayalalithaa was named the eternal general secretary of AIADMK. On 23 November 2017, the Election Commission of India granted the
Two Leaves symbol to the Palaniswami-Panneerselvam led AIADMK, authorizing the faction as the original AIADMK, and announced
by-polls to the vacant seat of Radhakrishnan Nagar on 21 December 2017. Dhinakaran contested in the constituency as an
independent candidate, and won the election with a huge margin, with around 40,000 votes more than his closest competitor. He became the first independent candidate in Tamil Nadu history to win a bypoll, claiming 50.32% of the total votes, defeating the ruling AIADMK and the opposition DMK. In March 2018, Dinakaran formed the new party
Amma Makkal Munnettra Kazagam (AMMK), with the goal of obtaining control of the AIADMK.
Rise of M. K. Stalin After Karunanidhi's demise on 7 August 2018, Karunanidhi's son and political heir
M. K. Stalin, who has served as the
Deputy Chief Minister of Tamil Nadu and the
Mayor of Chennai, became the unquestioned president of the DMK. The Election Commission of India announced
by-polls to 24 vacant seats in the state, alongside the
2019 Indian parliamentary elections, which elects 543 members across India to its
lower house, the
Lok Sabha. The DMK-led
Secular Progressive Alliance (nationally,
United Progressive Alliance headed by the
Indian National Congress) swept Tamil Nadu in the Lok Sabha elections, winning a landslide 38 seats out of
the state's 39 parliamentary constituencies. The AIADMK, which contested the election in an alliance with the
BJP and the regional
DMDK, won only one seat (
Theni). This marked a huge shift from the
2014 parliamentary elections, in which the AIADMK had won 37 seats solo, whereas the NDA won two and the DMK none. In the by-polls, out of the 24 formerly AIADMK seats in the state assembly, the Stalin-led DMK won over 13 seats while the AIADMK won 10, indicating a shift in the political mindset of the state's voters. Although the incumbent AIADMK government lost 13 of its seats to the opposition party, the 10 retained seats (with new MLAs to represent them) were enough to maintain the AIADMK's absolute majority at the Legislative Assembly.
Tussle in AIADMK over Chief Ministerial candidate The Tussle started in October 2020 when Minister for Milk and Dairy development
K. T. Rajenthra Bhalaji tweeted that the party should go for elections, with EPS as the CM candidate. A day before Balaji’s tweet, Cooperative Minister
Sellur K. Raju said, “MLAs will elect the chief minister” when AIADMK wins the 2021 elections. Finally, then DCM Panneerselvam made the announcement that Palaniswami would be the chief ministerial candidate of the AIADMK on 20 October 2020 morning at a much awaited meeting at the AIADMK office in Chennai.
Sasikala's Announcement In January 2021,
VK Sasikala was released from jail after completion of her prison time. In February 2021, she announced her intention to actively involve herself in the state's politics. Nevertheless, on 3 March 2021, she announced her decision to quit politics, to everyone's surprise.
Key Issues In order to improve the economy after the
COVID-19 pandemic, both the AIADMK and DMK promised jobs in their manifestos. Industries, especially MSMEs, have been hit hard by the slowdown in the economy. The AIADMK-led government approved a sub-quota in MBC of 10.5% for the
Vanniyars, who are particularly dominant in northern Tamil Nadu. The AIADMK & BJP also fulfilled the demand of grouping 7 castes under Devendrakula Velalar an agricultural community found in Tamil Nadu. Recent events such as the
Thoothukudi protest in 2018 against the district's
Sterlite Copper plant and the
Kattupalli fishermen's agitation against the expansion of Adani port have also made environmental concerns, especially
climate change, a topic of debate in the elections.
Madras High Court comments on Election Commission On 26 April 2021, the
Madras High Court remarked that the
Election Commission should be put on murder charges for allowing rallies. Further, the court said that the Election Commission was the only institution responsible for the deadly second wave of COVID-19 pandemic in India as the elections of four states and a union territory were being held when second wave was striking India. ==Schedule==