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'All India Anna Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam' (AIADMK) (Tamil: அனைத்து இந்திய அண்ணா திராவிட முன்னேற்ற கழகம்) is a regional political party in Tamil Nadu state in India. The party was founded by MG Ramachandran and is now headed by J. Jayalalithaa. The party headquarters is in Royapettah, Chennai and was gifted to the party in 1986 by its former leader Janaki Ramachandran, wife of MG Ramachandran.

Contents

MGR era

Succession crisis

Selvi.J.Jayalalitha era

Election history

Tamil Nadu

Pondicherry

External links

References

MGR era

The party was founded in 1972 by MG Ramachandran (popularly known as MGR), a veteran star of the Tamil film industry, and a popular politician, as a breakaway outfit from the DMK led by M Karunanidhi, the then chief minister, owing to differences between the two. Relations between the two parties have been marked by mutual contempt.
The government led by the DMK, was dismissed by a Central promulgation, after MGR filed a petition seeking enquiry into corruption charges. The Central Government was held by Congress Party, an ally of the AIADMK. The party came to power in 1977 after trouncing DMK in the next elections to the legislative assembly in the state and MGR was named the Chief Minister. He was sworn in as chief minister of the state on June 30,1977. In 1979, AIADMK became the first dravidian and non-congress party to be part of the Union Cabinet.

Slowly the relations between the Congress party and the AIADMK became strained and the DMK got closer to the Congress party. In the mid-term parliamentary elections of January 1980,the Congress party aligned with the DMK and the alliance won 37 out of 39 parliamentary seats from the state; the AIADMK had to contend with just two seats.
After returning to power, Prime Minister Indira Gandhi's government dismissed a number of state governments belonging to the opposition parties. That also included Dr.M.G.Ramachandran's government. Elections to the state legislature were held in late May 1980. Reversing the trend of Lok Sabha elections, the AIADMK won a comfortable majority in the state assembly by winning 129 seats out of 234. MGR was sworn in as chief minister for the second time on June 9, 1980.
In 1984, even with MGR's failing health and subsequent hospitalization abroad, the party managed to win the state elections in alliance with the Congress party that had improved relations with the AIADMK. Many political historians consider MGR's persona and charisma at this point of time as "infallible", and a logical continuation of his on-screen "good lad" image, strengthened by a ''mythical status'' of a phoenix. The victory of the AIADMK-Congress combine in the assembly elections seemed so certain that the DMK supremo M. Karunanidhi did not contest the assembly elections of 1984. MGR continued to enjoy popular support in his third tenure, which ended with his demise on December 24, 1987.

Succession crisis

Subsequently, MGR's wife Janaki Ramachandran rose to the party's leadership and led the government as the state's first woman chief minister till the state assembly was suspended and President's rule imposed. The party, in the absence of a personality of MGR's caliber, began to crumble with infighting and broke into two factions—one under Janaki Ramachandran, and the other under J. Jayalalithaa, a former cinema star, and associate of MGR. The state elections in 1989 saw DMK rising back to power with Karunanidhi at the helm. The factions led by Jayalalitha and Janaki merged in 1988 under the former's leadership. The DMK government was dismissed in 1990 by the central government led by prime minister Chandrasekhar, an ally of the AIADMK at that time, on accusations that the constitutional machinery in the state had broken down.

Selvi.J.Jayalalitha era

In the elections of 1991, the AIADMK was swept to power. Many political observers, have ascribed the landslide victory to the ''anti-incumbent'' wave arising out of the assassination of former Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi by suspected Tamil separatists fighting for a homeland in neighbouring Sri Lanka. The ensuing government was accused of large-scale corruption, but Jayalalithaa managed to hold on to power for a full-term of five years. But, public anger aimed at her as a result of the various corruption charges, ensured that she lost by a landlside in the next election in 1996. The victorious DMK held power till 2001, which saw Jayalalithaa regaining the mantle once again.
In her second term as chief minister, Ms. Jayalalitha avoided the blunders she committed during the first term. However, she was plagued by the corruption cases related to her earlier rule and had to sit out of the government for some time. After having been cleared by the courts she became chief minister again. She has been accused of arrogance and of not respecting colleagues and opposition leaders.
She undertook economic reforms and took many unpopular decisions such as banning of lottery tickets, restricting the liquor and sand quarying business to government agencies and banning of tobacco product sales. She also took ruthless action against gangsters, trouble makers, striking government employees and brought discipline and law and order to the stage.
She sent a special task force to the Satyamangalam forests in October 2004 to hunt down notorious sandalwood smuggler Veerappan.The operation was successful as Veerappan was finally killed by the task force on 18 October 2004.
However, the party lost all the seats in the elections in the Parliamentary elections held in 2004 to the opposition coalition comprising of all major opposition parties in the state. The government then embarked on a path to woo the electorate with populist schemes with an eye on the assembly elections scheduled for early 2006.
In the assembly elections of 2006, in spite of media speculations of a hung assembly, the AIADMK was pushed out of power owing to big sweep by the DMK lead by M Karunanidhi. It managed to hold on to only 61 assembly seats.

Election history

See pdf for summary.
AIADMK's worst poll performance ever in Tamil Nadu was registered in 1989 and its peak in 1991.

Tamil Nadu

Year	General Election	Votes Polled	Seats Won
1977	6th Assembly	5,194,876	130
1977	6th Lok Sabha	5,365,076	17
1980	7th Assembly	7,303,010	129
1980	7th Lok Sabha	4,674,064	2
1984	8th Assembly	8,030,809	134
1984	8th Lok Sabha	3,968,967	12
1989	9th Assembly	148,630	2
1989	9th Lok Sabha	4,518,649	11
1991	10th Assembly	10,940,966	164
1991	10th Lok Sabha	4,470,542	11
1996	11th Assembly	5,831,383	4
1996	11th Lok Sabha	2,130,286	0
1998	12th Lok Sabha	6,628,928	18
1999	13th Lok Sabha	6,992,003	10
2001	12th Assembly	8,815,387	132
2004	14th Lok Sabha	8,547,014	0
2006	13th Assembly	10,768,559	61

Pondicherry

Year	General Election	Votes Polled	Seats Won
1974	3rd Assembly	60,812	12
1977	4th Assembly	69,873	14
1977	6th Lok Sabha	115,302	1
1980	5th Assembly	45,623	0
1985	6th Assembly	47,521	6
1990	7th Assembly	76,337	3
1991	8th Assembly	67,792	6
1996	9th Assembly	57,678	3
1998	12th Lok Sabha	102,622	0
2001	10th Assembly	59,926	3
2006	11th Assembly		3

External links

★ Latest News & Updates about AIADMK

★ Official Site of the AIADMK party

★ Unofficial Site of the AIADMK party

★ Year of political roller-coaster - An overview of the party's performance in 2001

★ Information about AIADMK on Indian-Elections.com

★ EC report on elections

★ A brief history of AIADMK

References