As the state heads into a four-cornered contest, TVK general secretary and T Nagar candidate Bussy N Anand is confident his party is no longer just a new entrant, it is a genuine alternative.
In an interview with TNIE’s Prabhakar Tamilarasu, he speaks about the groundswell for Vijay, campaign restrictions, candidate selection, and why the TVK’s delimitation stand needs no daily repetition to carry weight.
You were contesting from Puducherry earlier. Now you are in T Nagar. What’s your experience on the ground here?
Wherever I go, I see problems that have been left unaddressed for years. In T Nagar itself – look at the housing clusters, the narrow lanes, barely four or five feet wide. Nobody has properly attended to them. People have been living there for generations without proper pattas – 45 years without documents. They are still living like that. And when it comes to rain– every five minutes of it and the water just pours through the rooftops. I visited one home during a campaign, and the moment it rained, water started pouring in from the iron roof sheets. The drainage is so bad that the whole area gets waterlogged. These are the problems here, and nobody has seriously addressed them for so long.
There has been criticism that Vijay is not confident of winning from a single seat, that’s why he is contesting from two constituencies. What’s your response?
It’s an unfair criticism. Every party will have their own strategy and for us, it is also a strategy to field him in two constituencies in different regions. This is not something new that only our Thalaivar is doing. Many leaders have contested in two constituencies in the past, to woo the voters in those regions.
There are reports of campaign meetings being cancelled after permissions were granted. What’s happening?
It’s a pattern. We apply, we get permission, then they cancel it with some condition or the other. The police keep changing the conditions –“don’t come here”, “don’t talk here”, “this venue is not allowed”. It’s clearly being used to restrict us.
We also hear that Vijay cancels the meetings after 6 pm, despite getting permission. What’s the reason?
We are scared of the DMK government, we can’t predict or see what they may do after it gets dark. We don’t want any situation where the public gets affected. So whenever there is a risk of that, we wrap things up quickly. We are not going to create trouble just to make a point. Thalaivar’s style is different – he doesn’t do drama for the cameras. If something needs to be addressed, he addresses it clearly and moves on.
As far as your candidate list is concerned, there is criticism that some candidates are newcomers with little political background.
Yes, around 20-30% candidates are fresh faces, who are not part of our Vijay’s Makkal Iyakkam and that’s intentional. But even among the newcomers, we have chosen people who have done real service in their areas. We haven’t given tickets based on money or muscle power. Those who came from the Congress or other parties – we have evaluated them carefully. Only those who have genuinely worked on the ground have been given a chance.
What is the TVK’s position on delimitation, and why is there no strong opposition from the party?
Our position is the same as the DMK and their alliance partners’ – we oppose it. Thalaivar was among the first to register that opposition. You don’t need to repeat it every day for it to count. He stated our stand clearly, and that’s our position.