SALEM: Veerapandi A Rajendiran, son of the late Veerapandi S Arumugam, is the frontrunner for the DMK’s candidature in Veerapandi constituency in the upcoming Assembly election. But he will have to work hard to win the seat, DMK sources themselves say.
Arumugam, the legendary DMK leader popularly known as Veerapandiyar, had achieved a hat-trick by winning the seat in 1962, 1967 and 1971. He won a fourth time in 1996.
The constituency, where around 75 per cent of the 1,79,464 voters are Vanniyars, is considered very prestigious for Veerapandiyar’s family — in the last 13 Assembly elections, his family members or relatives, both from the DMK and AIADMK, won from there 10 times.
Rajendiran, popularly known as Veerapandi Raja, was the winner in 2006. He sought the DMK ticket this time also and is expected to get it as the other applicants are his loyalists.
However, he will face a tough fight in the election itself, a senior DMK functionary here told Express. “Compared with the DMK, the AIADMK has more votes in Veerapandi. His victory margin was only 1,638 in 2006, when he defeated AIADMK’s Vijayalakshmi Palanisamy. Moreover, after the demise of Arumugam, faction fights started in the Salem DMK, which will be a major problem,” he said. “Besides, in the 2011 constituency delimitation, many ‘DMK areas’ were added to the Salem South constituency. In 2011, Raja had lost to S K Selvam by around 27,000 votes,” he added.
However, Raja’s loyalists are optimistic. Some of them told Express that in Veerapandi, totally 52 panchayats and four town panchayats are there. As the DMDK split 25,000 votes in 2006, Raja won with a narrow margin. Now the DMDK does not have that much of votebank in the constituency.
Raja said he will abide by the order of the party high command. “The chance of winning for DMK is high. Last time, the AIADMK secured more votes due to the allaince factor,” he claimed.