NEW DELHI: After dominating almost all the Hindi-speaking states in the north, the Bharatiya Janata Party wanted to test southern waters — a region where the party has historically struggled to gain ground.It planned expansion in Tamil Nadu, which has been under the control of two Dravidian giants for decades — the DMK and the AIADMK.However, as it turns out, the window that the BJP was looking for in Tamil Nadu was occupied by actor-turned-politician Vijay, as his party upended the political script of the state by becoming the single largest party in the Assembly elections.
What went wrong for BJP in Tamil Nadu?Missing face: BJP’s leadership vacuumThe BJP lacked what TVK had in abundance. While TVK rode on Vijay’s popularity and megastar status, the BJP had no equally popular leader to rely on for its election campaign in a state where cinema and politics go hand in hand.While speaking to The Times of India, political analyst Kannan Rajarathinam said that the BJP needs to rebrand itself if it wants to make any inroads in the state and requires a charismatic leader.Long before the polls, the BJP’s most popular leader in the state, Annamalai, was pushed to the margins to revive ties with the AIADMK.Reportedly, Palaniswami had made the ouster of Annamalai a precondition ahead of alliance talks, given his relentless attacks on the AIADMK.Identity clash: North-South fault lines The three-language policy and delimitation move also hurt the BJP’s poll prospects in Tamil Nadu. Chief minister MK Stalin and the Centre engaged in a standoff that reignited one of Tamil Nadu’s most politically charged fault lines.Narrative loss: TVK captures anti-DMK spaceMeanwhile, TVK positioned itself as an alternative for voters undecided between the DMK and the AIADMK-led NDA.It drew support from those unhappy with the DMK due to anti-incumbency, as well as voters wary of the NDA over issues such as the north-south divide, the three-language policy, and the delimitation debate.“BJP should rebrand itself as a Tamil-centric party, as it did in West Bengal by assimilating Bangla nationalism,” Kannan said.“BJP has to fiercely oppose the DMK and not polarise but become all-inclusive in Tamil Nadu to win people’s imagination,” he added.What if BJP had contested solo?In the 2024 Lok Sabha elections, the BJP contested independently in Tamil Nadu, without aligning with either the DMK or the AIADMK, and secured 11.24% of the vote share.This marked the first time the party entered double digits in the state and was more than three times its performance in the previous election.However, in the subsequent assembly elections, the BJP chose to ally with the AIADMK and contested 27 seats, managing to win just one.This highlights limitations of alliance politics, where seat-sharing can restrict a party’s ability to broaden its reach and consolidate support across constituencies.Had the BJP contested all seats independently, it is likely that its vote share would have increased further, even if that did not immediately translate into a higher number of seats.However, the 2026 election has rewritten this long-standing narrative. The entry of TVK, led by actor-turned-politician Vijay, has dramatically altered the state’s political equation. In its very first electoral outing, the party not only made significant inroads but also secured victory, ending the 59-year dominance of Dravidian parties.Meanwhile, TVK has followed in the footsteps of parties such as the Aam Aadmi Party, the Asom Gana Parishad, and the Telugu Desam Party in moving to form the government after its very first electoral outing.According to the Election Commission website, TVK was leading in 107 seats, the ruling DMK in 58 seats, and the AIADMK in 51. The majority mark in the Tamil Nadu Assembly polls is 118.
