BJP general secretary P. Muralidhar Rao, who is in charge of party affairs in Karnataka and also handles Tamil Nadu, sees a great, visible political vacuum building up in Tamil Nadu.
Mr. Rao, who travelled to Chennai on December 7 to prepare the ground for party president Amit Shah’s visit to Tamil Nadu, said Mr. Shah would meet cadres in Coimbatore, Palakkad, Kochi and Chennai.
“A great, visible vacuum is building up in Tamil Nadu. We have exactly one year to prepare for the elections in the State,” he said. The sense within the BJP is that after her conviction, AIADMK chief Jayalalithaa’s political position is not as stable as it was, while the DMK, with the tensions within the family, is crumbling.
The party hopes to tweak its “Haryana formula” for use in the southern States and combine it with attracting celebrities and public figures to its fold. The formula entails poaching leaders from other parties, targeting young voters and converting its new-found support base into party membership.
In Kerala, another State Mr. Shah is touring, the party won no seat but polled over 10 per cent votes in the Lok Sabha election.
