Former chief minister and AIADMK rebel leader O. Panneerselvam may have put up a brave face and parted ways with his long-time ally, the BJP. Though OPS has chosen to fight the BJP and had quit the NDA saying, “there are no permanent friends and foes in politics,” the saffron has decided not to be critical of him. BJP’s B.L. Santhosh, who was in Chennai, during a closed-door meeting with the party seniors, advised them not to criticise OPS.
The BJP insiders told THE WEEK that Santhosh advised the party functionaries to work in tandem with the AIADMK grass-roots level workers, and the only objective should be to remove DMK from the government in 2026. Santhosh is believed to have expressed his concern over the exit of OPS and how it will impact the NDA’s vote share in certain constituencies in South Tamil Nadu. Santhosh also expressed his opinion on the entry of actor Vijay’s Tamilaga Vettri Kazhagam and how it will split the votes in certain pockets across the state and impact the NDA’s vote share. The BJP leader had also informed the gathering that “Prime Minister Narendra Modi will soon take a call on the exit of OPS, probably during his next visit to Tamil Nadu.” Modi is expected to visit Chennai and Chidambaram by the end of August.
Incidentally, the BJP, which once brokered peace between the warring factions in the AIADMK—EPS and Edappadi K. Palaniswami, popularly known as EPS—and later made OPS stay with it as an ally, has decided to stay away from the AIADMK’s internal politics. In fact, when he was in Chennai, to a question on bringing back OPS, Sasikala and T.T.V. Dhinakaran into the party, Union Home Minister Amit Shah said, “It is their internal party affair.”
AIADMK general secretary EPS has made it clear that OPS will not be taken back into the party. “Time has lapsed,” EPS said in a TV interview recently. However, beleaguered OPS was waiting to hear from the Delhi masters. He believed that Delhi will either broker peace and make him get back into the AIADMK or have him as an ally, like it happened in 2024, and make him contest from the NDA fold in the upcoming 2026 elections. But OPS was silently shown the door. He had to wait without a reply when he asked for an appointment to welcome PM Modi at the Tiruchirappalli airport on July 26.
For the BJP, OPS leaving the alliance means a loss of the Mukkulathor community votes in South Tamil Nadu. While Nainar Nagendran, the present BJP chief, is from the south and from the same Mukkulathor community, the BJP and the AIADMK together may lose a section of the votes in the region. On the other hand, OPS’s political stock had plummeted to a large extent. Though he agreed to every advice of the BJP, including the advice to contest as an independent from the Ramanathapuram constituency in the 2024 Lok Sabha polls on Jackfruit symbol, he did not realise that he was being pushed to a corner and was being left in the lurch without an option.
While he has quit the NDA now and has decided to go on a statewide tour to meet the AIADMK cadres and retrieve the party, his political predicament remains unchanged. With no party or party symbol or even supporters by his side, his future hinges on his petition in the Election Commission of India. He had already petitioned the ECI, claiming the ownership of the AIADMK and that he should be recognised as the party’s coordinator as his five-year term ends only in 2026. He has told the ECI that the status quo of the AIADMK as of 2021 should continue, as the civil suit in the Madras High Court is pending. However, the ECI had informed the court that the case might take a longer time due to the workload arising out of the Bihar polls.
