Lok Sabha election 2024: The Coimbatore Lok Sabha constituency comprises 6 assembly segments– Palladam, Sulur, Kavundampalayam, Coimbatore (North), Coimbatore (South) and Signanallur.
Under Annamalai, the BJP has moved away from its traditional approach of entering an alliance with the AIADMK to fight elections in the southern state
Lok Sabha polls 2024: Coimbatore, often referred to as the Manchester of South India due to its massive textile production business, is all set to witness a nail biting clash between BJP’s firebrand Tamil Nadu president and former IPS officer K Annamalai, AIADMK IT wing secretary Singai Govindarasu Ramachandran and DMK’s Ganapathy P Rajkumar. The Coimbatore Lok Sabha constituency comprises 6 assembly segments– Palladam, Sulur, Kavundampalayam, Coimbatore (North), Coimbatore (South) and Signanallur.
Can Annamalai make it big in Leftist bastion?
Under Annamalai, the BJP has moved away from its traditional approach of entering an alliance with the AIADMK to fight elections in the southern state. The firebrand Tamil Nadu BJP chief’s En Mann, En Makkal padayatra has played an important role in gathering support for the saffron party across Tamil Nadu.
During this 7-month-long padayatra, Annamalai covered a distance of 1,770 kms across 39 parliamentary constituencies and 234 assembly segments in the state. Annamalai address more than 100 street campaign meetings and interacted with the public.
Commenting on Annamalai, PM Modi told Thanthi TV in a recent interview, “He is young, articulate and has a strong caste support. He is working for the country as well as Tamil Nadu.”
Annamalai on winning Coimbatore
Despite praise from the Prime Minister himself, Annamalai has been honest in accepting that the Coimbatore battle is a tough one. In an interview with ANI, Annamalai said that clinching the Coimbatore seat is a big challenge as every party has a certain assured voter base.
However, he was also confident that the developmental policies of the BJP will help the saffron party electorally. He further said that the ruling DMK played a “very interesting game” soon after his candidature from Coimbatore.
The DMK withdrew the communist candidate and fielded their own candidate instead. “DMK has taken that seat back because DMK believes by sheer muscle power and money power they can take that seat away from anybody,” he noted.
Coimbatore electoral trends
Historically, the seat has been a Leftist pocket borough as the CPI(M) has clinched victory on this seat 7 times, the Congress 5 times, the DMK twice and the AIADMK only once.
CP Radhakrishnan of the BJP won this seat in the 1998 and 1998 general elections. The 1998 and 1999 general elections were exceptions to the norm. Prior to that, the Coimbatore Lok Sabha seat went from the Congress in 1952 to the CPI in 1957 then back to the Congress in 1962. After this, the seat went to the CPI(M) in 1967 and then to the CPI in 1971 till 1980.
In 1980, the seat went to the DMK for the first time. After this, the Congress reestablished its dominance over the seat in 1980, which lasted till 1996. The DMK took the seat from the grand old Congress in 1996 and retained it till 1998. After 1998 and 1999 general elections, the saffron party has emerged as the runner-up in Coimbatore in the 2004, 2014 and 2019 general elections.
