Jayalalithaa's AIADMK holds Tamil Nadu
What happened
The All India Anna Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam won a second straight term running Tamil Nadu.
It won 134 of the 232 seats.
That left it 17 seats clear of a majority.
It polled 40.8% of the vote, which converted into 57.8% of the seats.
The Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam finished second, with 89 seats on 31.6% of the vote.
Turnout, the share of registered voters who actually cast a ballot, reached 74.8%.
The campaign
On 12 February 2016 the Election Commission announced that 17 Tamil Nadu constituencies would get paper-trail voting machines in about 4,000 polling booths. Chief Election Commissioner Nasim Zaidi then set the poll schedule on 4 March, with polling on 16 May and counting on 19 May.12
On 23 March, Vijayakanth announced his Desiya Murpokku Dravida Kazhagam would join Vaiko's People's Welfare Front as its chief ministerial candidate. The following month Gopi Shankar Madurai, a 25-year-old gender activist, filed nomination in Madurai North, becoming the election's first openly intersex and genderqueer candidate.34
The same week, the DMK finalised its seat-sharing arrangement, allotting 41 seats to ally Indian National Congress. The AIADMK said it would contest 227 of the state's 234 seats itself, with Chief Minister J Jayalalithaa seeking re-election from R K Nagar.56
Days before voting, the Election Commission postponed polling in Aravakurichi and Thanjavur over cash seizures and bribery complaints, rescheduling the vote to 23 May. Two weeks later it recommended cancelling the notification for both seats, citing seizures topping Rs 8 crore in cash and 2,500 litres of liquor meant for voters.78
- 1Election Commission Announces VVPAT Machines for 17 Constituencies — 2016 Tamil Nadu Legislative Assembly election
- 2Election Commission Announces Tamil Nadu Poll Schedule — 2016 Tamil Nadu Legislative Assembly election
- 3DMDK Joins Vaiko's People's Welfare Front, Vijayakanth Named CM Candidate — DMDK to contest polls with Vaiko's alliance; Vijayakanth CM candidate
- 4Gopi Shankar Madurai Contests as First Openly Intersex, Genderqueer Candidate — 2016 Tamil Nadu Legislative Assembly election
- 5DMK Allots Congress 41 Seats in Seat-Sharing Pact — Tamil Nadu Assembly Elections 2016: DMK allots 41 seats to Congress for Tamil Nadu polls, Bucking the trend
- 6AIADMK Announces 227-Seat List, Jayalalithaa to Contest R K Nagar — Tamil Nadu Assembly Elections 2016: AIADMK to contest in 227 constituencies, Jayalalithaa to fight from RK Nagar, Bucking the trend
- 7EC Defers Polling in Aravakurichi and Thanjavur Over Bribery Evidence — 2016 Tamil Nadu Legislative Assembly election, Blot on democracy: How corruption forced EC to postpone polling in one TN constituency
- 8EC Recommends Cancelling Election Notification for Two Seats Over Bribery — EC revokes poll in 2 TN seats, says voters bribed
What changed
The ADMK kept governing Tamil Nadu, even as its own seat tally slipped.
Its seat total fell by -16 from the previous election, while its vote share moved +2.4 pp.
That extended its winning streak to 2 elections in a row.
The DMK's vote share moved +9.3 pp, the sharpest shift of any major party.
The single biggest movement ran from the ADMK to the DMK, covering 51 of the 119 seats that changed hands statewide.
Turnout slipped -3.4 pp from the previous election.
Notable numbers
Radhapuram, Tamil Nadu saw the tightest finish of the election: the winner's margin — how far ahead the winner finished, in votes, over whoever came second — was 49 votes.
Thiruvarur, Tamil Nadu saw the widest margin of the election, with the winner finishing 34.7% of the vote ahead of the runner-up.
Palacode, Tamil Nadu recorded the highest turnout of any seat, with 88.6% of registered voters casting a ballot.
Shozhinganallur, Tamil Nadu was the largest constituency in the state by registered voters, with 6,02,472 names on its rolls.
Dr. Radhakrishnan Nagar, Tamil Nadu drew the most candidates anywhere in the state, 45 names on the ballot.
NOTA — 'None of the Above,' a ballot option letting voters formally reject every candidate on offer — drew 5,61,174 votes statewide, 1.3% of everything cast.
The backdrop
The DMK expelled M.G. Ramachandran as party treasurer on 17 October 1972, and he founded a rival party that was renamed the All India Anna Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam on 12 September 1976.9
That split created the state's second major Dravidian party, and DMK and AIADMK have contested every state assembly election since 1977.9
The ADMK's 134-seat win in 2016 continued that two-party contest, with the DMK again finishing second.
- 9MGR splits from DMK, founds AIADMK — All India Anna Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam