DMK Minister RaghupathiTamil Nadu Minister Raghupathi has ridiculed AIADMK leader Edappadi K. Palaniswami’s bold prediction that his alliance will sweep 210 seats in the upcoming Assembly elections, based on a controversial arithmetic from the 2024 Lok Sabha polls.Palaniswami claimed that combining AIADMK and BJP votes yielded 41.33% in segments covering 84 constituencies, projecting victory in over half of Tamil Nadu’s 234 seats. Raghupathi dismissed this as flawed “arithmetic,” noting the 2024 polls saw AIADMK and BJP contest separatelyāBJP allied with PMK, AMMK, TTV Dhinakaran’s Amma Makkal Munnetra Kazhagam (AMMK), and othersāwhile SDPI had exited AIADMK and DMDK’s status remains uncertain.
The minister highlighted Palaniswami’s flip-flop on BJP ties, from vowing no alliance in January 2024 to recent reconciliation, and past losses like one Lok Sabha seat in 2019 and selective by-election wins amid internal purges. Raghupathi questioned how such fragmented coalitions justify the sweeping forecast, urging Palaniswami to explain his “math.”