THOOTHUKUDI: Although DMK's Kanimozhi Karunanidhi swept the Lok Sabha polls to win the Thoothukudi constituency on Tuesday, data released shows a slight dip in the party's vote share in Thoothukudi, from 56.77% in 2019 to 55.25% this year. Notably, the NTK amped up its poll performance by almost tripling its vote share from the last election, which catapulted it to fourth place behind the AIADMK and BJP.
Kanimozhi returned for a second consecutive term with 5,40,729 votes out of the total 9,78,632 votes polled. A closer look at the numbers, however, reveals that the DMK MP secured 22,414 votes less than in the 2019 election when her vote count had stood at 5,63,143. According to the final result in Form 20, DMK has lost 9,169 votes in the Srivaikuntam assembly segment, 7,680 in Ottapidaram (reserved), 5,611 in Thoothukudi, and 2,681 in Kovilpatti, resulting in the dip in voter share.
The NTK, on the other hand, secured 18,879 votes in Vilathikulam as against 4,815 in 2019, 22,757 in Thoothukudi as against 13,682, 14,658 votes in Tiruchendur as against 7,317 votes in 2019, 17,571 in Srivaikuntam as against 6,012, 26,155 votes in Ottapidaram as against 11,089 in 2019, and 19,354 in Kovilpatti as against 5,899 in 2019. It is noteworthy that Kanimozhi lost 9,169 votes in Srivaikuntam, while NTK gained 11,559 additional votes in the segment, which was battered by the floods in 2023.
While the AIADMK has wrested its core vote bank of 15.12%, the vote share of the BJP-TMC alliance, represented by SDR Vijayseelan, spiralled to 12.51%. Part of the minor vote share is the TMC's minuscule presence in the district. On the split side, Vijayseelan scored 26,470 votes to garner the second spot trailing AIADMK in Srivaikuntam segment, which is also the highest for BJP in any segment in the Thoothukudi parliamentary constituency.
NTK's Dr Roweena Ruth Jane scored 1,20,300 votes, or 12.29%, thereby tripling the pro-Tamil party's vote share from 4.96% recorded in the 2019 election. In the last general election, the then-allied parties of AIADMK and BJP had jointly secured a vote share of 21.77%.
A political observer said that the rise in the vote bank of the NTK and BJP has substantially eroded the vote share of the Dravidian majors. The anti-DMK votes have been divided among the AIADMK, BJP, and NTK, he said. "The pro-Hindutva sentiment propagated among the Hindu Nadars, a majority in Srivaikuntam, helped the saffron party make inroads, said an observer wishing anonymity.
Speaking to TNIE, former NTK parliamentary constituency Organiser Christantine Rajasekar said that the NTK had scored 1,02,120 votes in the 2021 assembly election, sealing a vote share of 10.05%. But, the party lost nearly 8,000 votes in the Thoothukudi constituency this year, he said. "We lost nearly 12,000 votes because of the denial of the sugarcane farmer symbol by the Election Commission of India (ECI). The symbol went to independent candidate Arunadevi, who scored 6,072 votes," he noted.