The Bhartiya Janta Party has been trying make inroads into Tamil Nadu for a while now and things are starting to reflect on the ground. Moreover, the Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam or DMK politics has run its course and there is a fatigue factor, according to noted thinker S Gurumurthy in a special conversation with NDTV's Editor in Chief Sanjay Pugalia. He pointed out that DMK provoked the Prime Minister with the "Go Back Modi" slogan and Modi is not known to take provocations lightly.
Modi and the BJP have a decades-long plan to break into the Dravidian fortress of Tamil Nadu with sustained reachout to the state, even as the ruling DMK is faced with ideological confusion, Gurumurthy explained.
The Tamil society is more religious than before and the state's Dravidian politics is in a churn because of it, he said. "DMK is in huge ideological confusion. This is the time BJP entered the state... Narendra Modi has a decades-long plan and has decided to take the Tamil platform," Gurumurthy said.
For the Prime Minister, Tamil Nadu is not a political challenge, but an intellectual and cultural one, said the chairman of think tank Vivekananda International Foundation. "DMK tried to give political interpretation to small differences between the north and south. A lot of economic and social integration has taken place since Independence."
For nearly 50 years, Tamil Nadu politics has been dominated by the two Dravidian parties—the DMK and the All India Anna Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam or the AIADMK. Now, the BJP, fronted by Modi himself, has been campaigning extensively in the state in this election, hoping to increase its influence and emerge as the principal national party.
The Congress is part of the DMK-led alliance, which is hoping to repeat its 2019 feat of bagging 38 of the 39 Lok Sabha seats in Tamil Nadu.
Gurumurthy chided opposition leaders for alleging a "threat to democracy" under the Modi government, saying those accused of corruption and booked under anti-money laundering laws cannot absolve themselves of such charges by discrediting the country's democratic set-up.
Modi was able to transform himself and convince the electorate to give the party a majority in the Parliamentary elections, he added crediting the Prime Minister for his leadership during the Covid-19 pandemic by emphasising local production of vaccine and the government's stance of neutrality in the Russia-Ukraine war.
"India has emerged as the only player that can avoid a Cold War in the future. This time, you are not just electing a leader for India, but for the world," he said.
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