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Former IPS officer Annamalai named TN’s BJP chief

ByDivya Chandrababu
Jul 09, 2021 01:31 AM IST

Chennai: Former IPS officer K Annamalai has been appointed as the new BJP chief of Tamil Nadu

Chennai: Former IPS officer K Annamalai has been appointed as the new BJP chief of Tamil Nadu. He succeeds L Murugan a day after the latter was inducted into the reshuffled union cabinet.

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Murugan has been appointed as union minister of state for fisheries, animal husbandry and dairying, and information and broadcasting. His elevation is seen as a reward for his work as the party chief of the southern state where the BJP won four seats, after a gap of 15 years, in the recently held assembly elections.

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Both Murugan and Annamalai lost in the recently held assembly elections in Tamil Nadu in the constituencies of Dharmapuram and Aravakurichi respectively. Annamalai, a Karnataka cadre, resigned from his post in 2019 and joined the BJP last year. “He will be a youth icon,” said BJP vice-president KS Narendran. “He has shown that he is a strict and good administrator as an IPS officer. He left the services at a young age and joined us because of his nationalistic ideals.”

The party hopes that 37-year-old Annamalai will draw in more youngsters ahead of the local body elections slated later for the year and with an eye on the 2024 Lok Sabha polls. Since 2019, he is the third leader to take charge of the BJP’s top post in Tamil Nadu. Murugan took over as BJP chief six months after his predecessor Tamilisai Soundararajan was made Governor of Telangana. Since earlier this year she is also holding additional charge as Lieutenant-Governor of Puducherry.

Before his appointment as BJP state president in March 2020, Murugan was the national SC/ST commission vice-president and he practised law in the Madras high court for 15 years. The Dalit leader hasn’t had much success electorally having made his debut in the 2006 assembly elections in Sankari constituency. This year he lost from Dharapuram, a seat reserved for Scheduled Castes. Prime Minister Narendra Modi campaigned for him.

Murugan joined the ABVP during his college days. As state coordinator for the BJP’s SC Morcha wing, he was associated with President Ramnath Kovind who was then the national coordinator. Speaking to reporters in Delhi, Murugan on Thursday said he will work towards the development of Tamil Nadu’s education and culture. “I will work towards making Tamil Nadu the foremost state,” he said.

Tamil Nadu has always been a tough state for the BJP to appease and in his short time, Murugan brought in several known faces to the party such as Ananmalai, DMK’s deputy general secretary V P Duraisamy, Ku Ka Selvam, actor turned politician Khushboo Sundar and several Tamil film personalities. Although there was criticism from the old guard over actors and other party members jumping ship as not being true to Hindutva, there was no denial that the BJP was in the limelight in Tamil Nadu which was relegated to a fringe, hitherto.

Murugan strayed away from the Ayodhya issue in the state, where it didn’t have much traction and pressed on localised worship of his namesake deity Lord Murugan to consolidate the Hindu votes.

Experts see these appointments from the OBC community as the BJP’s way of representation and caste consolidation. The party is in agreement. Duraisamy who shifted from the DMK to BJP last year says that Murugan’s elevation makes the cadre and community happy. “He is the first Arunthathiyar from Tamil Nadu to be a union minister. People will show their gratitude for this towards the BJP in the future,” says Duraisamy.

“It can also be viewed as a safe and honourable exit for Murugan to pave the way for Mr Annamalai. Tamizhisai was similarly given such an honourable exit,” said political commentator Sriram Seshadri. “It’s been a probable plan for the last one year by the RSS and the Central BJP leadership. While Tamil Nadu needed to be represented, instead of accommodating the AIADMK in the Council of Ministers, BJP has taken the berth through the Rajya Sabha route.”

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