CHENNAI: In a systematic push by the DMK to step up its election preparedness at the grassroots level, cadres on Monday took an oath – ‘I will not let Tamil Nadu bow its head in shame’ – at locations across all 68,000 polling booths in the state, coinciding with party founder C N Annadurai’s 117th birth anniversary.
DMK president and Chief Minister M K Stalin administered the oath to the party functionaries at Anna Arivalayam, the party headquarters, in Chennai, wherein Deputy CM Udhayanidhi Stalin and senior leaders took part. They also paid tribute to the portrait of Annadurai. Stalin posted on X that Anna made Tamil Nadu to hold its head high and on Monday the DMK cadres vowed to not let it bow down.
Simultaneously, party cadres assembled those enrolled under the DMK’s Oraniyil Tamil Nadu campaign at all the polling booths. They carried banners displaying the five-point pledge and took the pledge. The party cadres were asked to take pictures of the event and send them to their respective district party office and to the party headquarters.
The party cadres resolved to protect the state against NEET, delimitation, SIR, and the denial of education funds as well as the ‘blacking out of Tamil Nadu’s civilisational heritage by the centre’. The same oath will be taken at the party’s mass gathering, the ‘Mupperum Vizha’, in Karur on September 17. Public meetings will be held in all district units on September 20 and 21.
AIADMK general secretary Edappadi K Palaniswami on Monday invoked Annaism — the policy document released by party founder MG Ramachandran in 1973 — as he vowed to return the party to power in the 2026 Assembly election.
In his message on the birth anniversary of former chief minister CN Annadurai, after whom the party is named, Palaniswami said the AIADMK would form a government that upholds Annaism. He paid floral tributes to Annadurai’s portrait at his residence in Chennai. “Let us march on the path of social justice charted by Anna.
Let us pledge to liberate Tamil Nadu, trapped in the grip of dynastic rule, and establish an AIADMK government that upholds Annaism for the common people,” Palaniswami said. AMMK general secretary TTV Dhinakaran, former CM O Panneerselvam and V K Sasikala also paid tributes to Annadurai.