Has Udhay started LS polls campaign early?

CHENNAI: State Sports Minister cum DMK youth wing secretary Udhayanidhi Stalin appears to have kicked off his campaign for the 2024 Lok Sabha polls early. In the pretext of prepping for the proposed December 17 state conference of the youth wing headed by him, Udhayanidhi has been training his guns at Prime Minister Narendra Modi led-BJP regime and its ally AIADMK at exhausting regularity of late.

Starting from Kancheepuram on August 19, Stalin junior has covered 10 districts, including a major part of the Delta districts and a couple of northern districts in less than a fortnight.

In almost all the venues, the Minister, more than harping over Kalaignar centenary and the youth wing conference, has been flagging the ‘failed’ promises of the BJP-led Centre and popularising its splendid own goals like demonetisation and faulty GST implementation.

The scion of the DMK has made it a point not to forget a mention of the Rs 15 lakh deposit in each Indian’s bank account, campaign statement of the PM, which was publicly called a “political jumla” by Union Home Minister Amit Shah long ago, in every meeting. And, it does not stop there. Udhayanidhi also spends substantial time raising the Manipur fiasco and even the latest CAG expose germane to a few Ministries of the Union government in the meetings. However, none of the meetings end without him raking up the Adani question. Even at Thittakudi in Cuddalore on Tuesday, Udhayanidhi brandished the photograph of Modi and Adani on board an aircraft, the same photograph, which caused a political storm when Congress MP Rahul Gandhi did the same in the Lok Sabha during the peak of the Hindenburg revelation a few months ago.

“The actual purpose of the meeting was assimilating new and old youth wing office-bearers and preparing them for the conference. But, he (Udhay) has been going hammer and tongs against the BJP and casually taunting the AIADMK as well. The content and speech also sounds glaringly similar to the campaign speeches. There is a perception that he has kicked off the campaign early this time,” a DMK senior said.

“Probably, Udhay must have seized the opportunity after seeing the turnout. We expected a few hundred office-bearers. But, around 3,000 has been the lowest turnout so far. Every meeting is attended by Ministers, district secretaries and all functionaries, so, what prevents him from going all guns blazing against the BJP in the run up to the LS polls. It is an early start,” a state-level youth wing functionary on condition of anonymity remarked, predicting fireworks in the upcoming Tiruvallur meeting in a few days.