TIRUPUR: The caste-based political leanings that had long since influenced the electorate of Tirupur and the Kongu belt seems to have had little effect in the Lok Sabha election of 2019.
The nearly 85 per cent-strong Kongu population’s vote seems to have been split across the board to help further the success of DMK’s ally CPI, much to the unpleasant surprise of the AIADMK that had always counted Tirupur as its stronghold. While religious sentiments and near lack of rationalist leanings had helped the AIADMK, and recently the BJP, gain ground in the Kongu region, it might have been AIADMK’s alliance with the BJP that sounded the death knell for the combine’s victory.
How else does one explain the CPI, which secured just 33,331 votes in 2014, managing a clear margin of 93,368 votes over AIADMK’s M S M Anandan this time around?
Why the change?
While demonetisation and implementation of the GST have been blamed for the discontent among several sections of the population across the country, it perhaps has had real effects on who has been chosen to represent the people of Tirupur.
In the wake of demonetisation, nearly 90 per cent of Tirupur’s industries that had been heavily dependent on the cash economy came crashing down. Thousands of units had to shut down, many people lost their only source of livelihood and several industrialists were pushed to suicide too. GST was no better.
Nearly 40 per cent of returns filed since have been cleared, they say.
This might have been the case in many districts in the State but what makes it all the more significant here
is the people’s collective temperament.
Allegiance under attack
The AIADMK teaming up with the BJP did not just go against Tirupur’s expectations after the failure of the two Central schemes, it hit them where it seems to have hurt most – their allegiance to party bastions MGR and Jayalalithaa. The Kongu region’s loyalty to the party was a result of their long-standing allegiance to its leaders.
When Jayalalithaa, in the 1990s, declared that she would not align with the BJP, Tirupur welcomed it with great enthusiasm. When her successors overturned that decision soon after her death, it did not go down well with these supporters.
Alliance done right
In Tirupur Lok Sabha constituency’s six assembly segments – Perundurai, Bhavani, Anthiyur, Gobichettipalayam, Tiruppur North and Tiruppur South, CPI’s Subbarayan secured a margin of over 10,000 votes in seven segments. Only in the Perundurai did the difference dip to 3,500 votes.