New Delhi:Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and the All India Anna Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (AIADMK) will fight the upcoming Tamil Nadu Assembly polls together, Union Minister Amit Shah announced on Friday. While making the announcement at a press conference in Chennai, Shah said the alliance will fight under the leadership of AIADMK chief Edappadi Palaniswami.
“AIADMK and BJP leaders have decided that AIADMK, BJP and all the alliance parties will contest the upcoming Vidhan Sabha elections in Tamil Nadu together as NDA,” Shah said.
“These elections will be contested under the leadership of PM Modi on a national level and under the leadership of AIADMK leader Edappadi K Palaniswami on the state level,” he said.
On the question of conditions put forth for alliance by AIADMK, Shah refuted the reports asserting “there was no demand” by the party.
Shah also said that AIADMK has been part of the NDA since 1998 and PM Modi and former CM and AIADMK chief J Jayalalithaa had worked together in the past. Shah while answering to “what took so long ” question said, “It took time because this alliance is now permanent.”
On March 28, Annamalai described the 2026 elections as an opportunity to dethrone the DMK, citing corruption allegations and a “deteriorating law and order situation” in the state. “The DMK should be brought down from power and no vote should get wasted by the votes getting shifted between different parties. Tamil Nadu, as of now, has a five-cornered contest. Nowhere else in the Indian politics you see a five-cornered contest,” he said.
He reiterated that alliance decisions rest with BJP’s national leadership. “With respect to the alliance, you have to understand that for a national party like the BJP, a disciplined party, it is our national leadership that will decide. So, we have committees, we have parliamentary boards which look into a lot of angles before they make the decision.
