Annamalai to quit BJP, launch ‘secular’ Tamil Nadu party with national outlook

CHENNAI: Former Tamil Nadu BJP president K Annamalai will quit the saffron party in a couple of days and launch a “secular, regional party with a national outlook, perhaps even Dravidian in a redefined way”, sources told TOI . He is expected to float the party “in six to eight months”.Annamalai is scheduled to meet Union home minister Amit Shah, BJP’s national president Nitin Nabin and general secretary (organisation) BL Santhosh in Delhi Tuesday to “explain the reasons for his leaving”, a source said.The IPS officer-turnedpolitician’s confidants said he wanted the new party to oppose BJP and others on issues. “If putting Tamil Nadu first is Dravidianism, he calls it Dravidian 2.0, which will function within the Indian framework. He wants to take everyone, including minority communitie, outside and inside Hindus, along, and have Tamil pride without being chauvinistic,” said a source.Annamalai has had disagreements with the BJP brass in the past 18 months over its alliance with AIADMK and, later, candidate selection for the just-concluded assembly election.While he wanted to build from the ground up, even if it took long, the national leadership chose to piggyback on AIADMK with the sole objective of defeating DMK, sources said.Annamalai thinks actor and Tamil Nadu chief minister Vijay’s success on his political debut has created a “fracture that has opened space for new forces”, also marking “the end of a 60-year Dravidian cycle”, as a source put it. “Like before, TN politics will have two poles in the 2031 assembly polls. Annamalai wants to be the second pole.”Sources quoted Annamalai as telling his confidants that “Vijay gave hope to youngsters that they can succeed in politics without money power or caste considerations”.“But when many of them, including technocrats from abroad, went to TVK, they found the old fans’ association people blocking the door. This is where we can open the doors. In two years, we can prove to be a force to reckon with,” Annamalai is learned to have said.The former BJP state chief is also confident of getting some political veterans from other parties on his side. “Many have been staying away because he is with BJP. Once he floats a new party, they will join him,” said a source.His associates said moves were afoot to register the new party or acquire a name already registered by someone. “This can be done in Annamalai’s name only once he quits BJP,” said the source.There is a possibility of a “social organisation” being launched as a prelude to the founding of the political party, said another source.