Kongunadu Makkal Desiya Katchi (KMDK) founder-leader E R Eswaran will contest the coming Lok Sabha election from the Pollachi constituency in Coimbatore district. The KMDK, a constituent of the BJP-led National Democratic Alliance in Tamil Nadu, was allotted one seat under the seat-sharing arrangement.
While the DMK has fielded former minister Pongalur Palanisamy from the constituency, the AIADMK had announced the candidature of C Mahendran. The Left parties are not in the fray and the Congress is yet to announce a candidate.
Eswaran, whose name was cleared by the party at a meeting held at Tiruvalluvar Thidal in Pollachi on Sunday evening, hoped that he would emerge victorious in the four-cornered contest. Qualifying his candidature, Eswaran said he had participated in numerous protests seeking to get benefits for farmers in the region.
“I had joined youth and women in walking nearly 186 km demanding the implementation of the Avinashi-Athikadavu water project apart from undertaking a 54 km walk for implementing the Anamalaiyar Nallar water scheme,” he said. If elected he would ensure that these schemes are completed. The 52-year-old owner of a garment factory, who is an engineering graduate and a native of Erode district, had in 2009 contested from the Coimbatore Lok Sabha constituency on a Kongunadu Munnetra Kazhagam (the parent party) and polled over 1.27 lakh votes.
Eswaran accused the sitting Pollachi MP Sugumar of doing nothing for the development of the coconut farmers in the region.
He claimed that when he met BJP’s prime ministerial candidate Narendra Modi in Chennai recently, the latter assured to take up interlinking of rivers in the country from Ganga to Cauvery. “Although it was a struggle to complete the seat-sharing exercise among the NDA constituents, it has developed into a strong alliance that would catapult Modi to the prime minister’s seat,” he claimed.