In this episode, we continue our state by state analysis of this set of assembly elections currently underway and we look at Tamil Nadu which goes to vote on April 6. We often frame the question, for each state, in terms of what has changed politically since the last assembly election in 2016 and nowhere has the change been as dramatic as seismic as in Tamil Nadu where the intervening years saw the passing away of the DMK’s M Karunanidhi and the AIADMK’s J Jayalalithaa. Between them, for decades the two held such an iron grip on their respective party structures and the state’s politics. In the power vacuum, that has naturally ensued since their passing, is there an opportunity for change and a new kind of political paradigm to emerge?
Guest: Narayan Lakshman, Associate Editor, The Hindu
Episode Notes:
Narayan Lakshman on the challenges facing the two Dravidian parties in Tamil Nadu
New Paradigm for Dravidianism