“Annamalai Is On The Side Of Democracy, DMK & ADMK On The Side Of Moneycracy”, Says IPDS Founder Thirunavukkarasu

Just on 16 April 2024, IPDS’s Thirunavukkarasu was in the news for not being allowed to release the opinion poll survey results for the upcoming Lok Sabha elections for the Coimbatore constituency. The constituency is seeing a closely fought contest between TN BJP head Annamalai, ADMK’s Singai Ramachandran, and DMK’s Ganapathy Rajkumar.

Speaking to I Tamil News 24×7 channel on Annamalai, he said, “An ordinary man transforming into a leader needs to be seen closely. The face value that Kamaraj, Anna, MGR, Jayalalithaa, and Karunanidhi had is now being seen in Annamalai. That is a very surprising and intriguing fact. I am not saying this to become famous or for pride. I have never seen Annamalai face to face.”

When counter-questioned that he was comparing bigger leaders with a newbie in politics, Thirunavukkarasu shared an anecdote. He said, “In Singanallur, we met someone called Jagadish. He sees this candidate as his last hope. Generally, a voter has a very low understanding of his constituency’s candidate. Most of the people aged 60 and above would never budge from shifting their votes. They are loyal to the party (DMK or ADMK) till death. But today, the children of these loyalists are looking for change. They consider both Dravidian parties, the DMK, and the ADMK as corrupt. And they see Annamalai as that change and are willing to support him. They feel they are not going to gain anything from voting for DMK or ADMK but they know that Modi is coming back to power at the centre so they want to vote for DMK and want to give a new lease of life to Coimbatore through Annamalai. They see Coimbatore ridden with open drainages, and a drug centre, and to save the city from going any worse, they want Annamalai to win. I saw this with my own eyes on the ground.” 

When the interviewer questioned Thirunavukkarasu on GST stating that because of GST many businesses have been paralysed. He claimed that opposition parties state that before GST was implemented, there were more MSMEs in Coimbatore and that the Modi government was destroying MSMEs in the city and decreasing job availability for the youth.

Thirunavukarasu said, “Those who are in the industry know that the issue is not because of GST. The common man is not bothered about GST. They only see Modi coming to power in the centre and if Annamalai is elected, he will do something good for Coimbatore. DMK is playing politics with GST. They set up a girl in Tirupur and this is child’s play for them. They tried to create controversy with that girl but it is not even an issue at the ground level, among voters. They are not affected by it. The common man understands that the state government is looking for votes for political gains and for that, the DMK’s leader and CM MK Stalin is on a rampage to do anything and everything to prevent BJP from winning in Tamil Nadu. They feel it is ok if ADMK wins, this was said by a district secretary at a meeting. If this is the case, see how low their quality has degraded to. Sabareesan was in Coimbatore yesterday. He tells ADMK cadres that we know we are losing but give us support clandestinely, we will bring down Annamalai. This is such a shameful thing happening in a democratic country. Democracy means winning and losing in elections lawfully. But today, they are conspiring to make their opposition candidates lose. Not only that, the government officials, police officials, and election officials in Coimbatore are all slaves of the state government, they are not doing any of their election duties properly. The Union Secretary and the City Secretary are assigning 10 people per booth and asking them to distribute 500 rupees per vote, the DMK is doing this. This is a moneycracy vs democracy election. So in Coimbatore we are seeing, on the side of democracy is Annamalai, and on the side of money are the DMK and ADMK and it is a contest between the two.”

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