The tenth legislative assembly election of

Tamil Nadu Tamil Nadu (; , TN) is a state in southern India. It is the tenth largest Indian state by area and the sixth largest by population. Its capital and largest city is Chennai. Tamil Nadu is the home of the Tamil people, whose Tamil languag ...

was held on 24 June 1991. The All India Anna Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (AIADMK) –

Indian National Congress The Indian National Congress (INC), colloquially the Congress Party but often simply the Congress, is a political party in India with widespread roots. Founded in 1885, it was the first modern nationalist movement to emerge in the British ...

(INC) alliance won the elections in a landslide and AIADMK general secretary

J. Jayalalithaa Jayaram Jayalalithaa (24 February 1948 – 5 December 2016) was an Indian politician and actress who served as Chief Minister of Tamil Nadu for more than fourteen years over six terms between 1991 and 2016. From 9 February 1989 to 5 December 2 ...

became the chief minister. This was her first term in office. The united strength of AIADMK (after the merger of Jayalalithaa and

Janaki Ramachandran Vaikom Narayani Janaki (30 November 192319 May 1996), also known as Janaki Ramachandran, was an Indian politician, actress and activist who served as the chief minister of Tamil Nadu for 23 days after the death of her husband M. G. Ramachandra ...

and R M Veerappan faction, who was made Joint General Secretary of AIADMK]), the alliance with the Congress, and the wave of public sympathy in the wake of Rajiv Gandhi assassination combined to produce a massive victory for the AIADMK. The DMK could only win 2 seats. This was the worst performance of the DMK since it entered electoral politics in the

1957 1957 ( MCMLVII) was a common year starting on Tuesday of the Gregorian calendar, the 1957th year of the Common Era (CE) and ''Anno Domini'' (AD) designations, the 957th year of the 2nd millennium, the 57th year of the 20th century, and the 8th y ...

Background

President's rule

On 30 January 1991, the DMK government which had come to power after winning the 1989 assembly election, was dismissed by the Indian Prime minister Chandra Shekhar using

Article 356 In India, President's rule is the suspension of state government and imposition of direct Union government rule in a state. Under Article 356 of the Constitution of India, if a state government is unable to function according to Constitutional ...

of the Indian Constitution. President's rule was imposed on Tamil Nadu from 31 January. The reason cited for the dismissal was the deterioration of law and order in the state. The dismissal followed pressure on the Chandra Shekhar government by the Congress and AIADMK to dismiss the DMK government. The Chandra Shekhar government fell in March 1991 after the Congress withdrew its outside support. Fresh elections for both the Indian parliament and Tamil Nadu Legislative Assembly were scheduled for June 1991.

Unification of AIADMK

The AIADMK which had contested and lost the 1989 elections as two different factions reunited under the leadership of Jayalalithaa in February 1989. The V. N. Janaki Ramachandran faction merged with the Jayalalithaa faction to form a single united party and Janaki retired from politics. The reunited party regained the popular "Two Leaves" symbol of the AIADMK. (The Election Commission of India had frozen the symbol for the 1989 elections due to the split). The united AIADMK was able to prove its strength immediately by winning the elections held for two constituencies - Marungapuri and Madurai East on 11 March 1989. (for these two constituencies elections had been postponed earlier due to technical reasons).The AIADMK then allied with the Congress for the 1989 Parliamentary elections. The AIADMK-Congress alliance won 38 of the 39 Lok Sabha seats in that election routing the DMK- Janata Dal led National Front.

Formation of PMK

The 1991 elections was the first state elections contested by the Pattali Makkal Katchi (PMK), a labour class based party.

S. Ramadoss S. Ramadoss is an Indian politician. He is the founder of the Pattali Makkal Katchi, an Indian political party. Vanniyar reservation protest In 1987, the Vanniyar Sangham under Ramadoss organized the 1987 Vanniyar reservation agitation deman ...

, the leader of the Vanniyar caste organisation which demanded proportional reservation in education and employment based on population ratio of each community – the ''Vanniyar Sangam'' converted into a political party and entered electoral politics with the 1989 parliamentary elections. The emergence of PMK cut into the DMK's political base in the northern districts of Tamil Nadu.

Formation of TMK

In 1991, the

Thayaga Marumalarchi Kazhagam Thayaga Marumalarchi Kazhagam ( ta, தாயக மறுமலர்ச்சி கழகம்) was a political party in the Indian state of Tamil Nadu launched by Tamil film maker T. Rajendar in 1991. The party was formed as a split from Dra ...

(TMK) was formed by the actor-politician Vijaya T. Rajendar after he split from the DMK. Later, some of the second rung leaders of the ADMK including Su. Thirunavukkarasar, K. K. S. S. R. Ramachandran, S. D. Ugamchand, V. Karuppasamy Pandian split from the party. For the 1991 elections they formed a pact with T. Rajendar and contested as TMK candidates.

Assassination of Rajiv Gandhi

On 21 May 1991, leader of the Indian National Congress and its prime ministerial candidate for the 1991 general elections was assassinated by a

LTTE The Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE; ta, தமிழீழ விடுதலைப் புலிகள், translit=Tamiḻīḻa viṭutalaip pulikaḷ, si, දෙමළ ඊළාම් විමුක්ති කොටි, t ...

suicide bomber. The assassination took place at a campaign meeting at

Sriperumpudur Sriperumbudur is a town panchayat in the Kanchipuram district of the Indian state of Tamil Nadu. It is located 40 kilometers southwest of the capital city of Chennai on the National Highway 4 and is just outside the Chennai Metropolitan Are ...

where he was campaigning for the Congress candidate Maragatham Chandrasekar.

Coalitions

The two main political formations in this election were the DMK and AIADMK led fronts. The DMK coalition comprised the

Communist Party of India Communist Party of India (CPI) is the oldest Marxist–Leninist communist party in India and one of the nine national parties in the country. The CPI was founded in modern-day Kanpur (formerly known as Cawnpore) on 26 December 1925. ...

(CPI),

Communist Party of India (Marxist) The Communist Party of India (Marxist) (abbreviated as CPI(M)/CPIM/CPM) is a Marxist–Leninist communist political party in India. It is the largest communist party of India in terms of membership and electoral seats and one of the na ...

(CPM), Janata Dal (JD) and Thayaga Marumalarchi Kazhagam (TMK). The AIADMK front had only two major parties – itself and the Congress. The AIADMK also backed the ICS (SCS) candidate

Sanjay Ramasamy Sanjay Ramasamy is an Indian politician and former Member of the Legislative Assembly. He was elected to the Tamil Nadu legislative assembly as an Indian Congress (Socialist) – Sarat Chandra Sinha candidate from Virudhunagar constituency i ...

in the Virudhunagar constituency. Several smaller parties like the PMK contested the elections alone.

Seat allotments

AIADMK Front

DMK Front

Voting and results

The polling for the state assembly elections were held simultaneously with the polling for the 1991 Parliamentary elections on 24 June 1991. The voter turnout was 63.92%.

Results by Pre-Poll Alliance

1991 tamil nadu legislative election map by parties

, - ! style="background-color:#E9E9E9;text-align:left;vertical-align:top;" , Alliance/Party !style="width:4px" , ! style="background-color:#E9E9E9;text-align:right;" , Seats won ! style="background-color:#E9E9E9;text-align:right;" , Change ! style="background-color:#E9E9E9;text-align:right;" , Popular Vote ! style="background-color:#E9E9E9;text-align:right;" , Vote % ! style="background-color:#E9E9E9;text-align:right;" , Adj. %^‡ , - ! style="background-color:#009900; color:white", AIADMK+ alliance ! style="background-color: " , , 225 , +172 , 14,738,042 , colspan=2 style="text-align:center;vertical-align:middle;", 59.8% , - , AIADMK ! style="background-color: #008000" , , 164 , +137 , 10,940,966 , 44.4% , 61.1% , - , INC ! style="background-color: #00FFFF" , , 60 , +34 , 3,743,859 , 15.2% , 56.2% , - , ICS(SCS)^† ! style="background-color: #800000" , , 1 , +1 , 53,217 , 0.2% , 56.1% , - ! style="background-color:#FF0000; color:white", DMK+ alliance ! style="background-color: " , , 7 , -164 , 7,405,935 , colspan=2 style="text-align:center;vertical-align:middle;", 30.0% , - , DMK ! style="background-color: #FF0000" , , 2 , -148 , 5,535,668 , 22.5% , 29.9% , - ,

TMK TMK (russian: Тяжелый Межпланетный Корабль - ''Tyazhely Mezhplanetny Korabl'' or ''Heavy Interplanetary Vessel'') was the designation of a Soviet space exploration project to send a crewed flight to Mars and Venus (TMK- ...

! style="background-color: #FF00FF" , , 2 , -1 , 371,645 , 1.5% , 31.0% , - , CPI(M) ! style="background-color: #000080" , , 1 , -14 , 777,532 , 3.2% , 31.2% , - , JD ! style="background-color: #FFFF00" , , 1 , +1 , 415,947 , 1.7% , 28.3% , - , CPI ! style="background-color: #0000FF" , , 1 , -2 , 305,143 , 1.2% , 29.9% , - ! style="background-color:gray; color:white", Others ! style="background-color:gray" , , 2 , -8 , 2,505,431 , colspan=2 style="text-align:center;vertical-align:middle;", 10.2% , - , PMK ! style="background-color: #800080" , , 1 , +1 , 1,452,982 , 5.9% , 7.0% , - , JP ! style="background-color: " , , 0 , -4 , 51,564 , 0.2% , 0.7% , - , IND ! style="background-color: #666666" , , 1 , -5 , 390,227 , 1.6% , 1.7% , - , style="text-align:center;" , Total ! style="background-color: " , , 234 , – , 24,649,408 , 100% , style="text-align:center;" , – , - †: ICS(SCS) contested in 13 different constituencies, but only the one contested by Sanjay Ramaswamy was endorsed by AIADMK.
‡: Vote % reflects the percentage of votes the party received compared to the entire electorate that voted in this election. Adjusted (Adj.) Vote %, reflects the % of votes the party received per constituency that they contested.
Sources: Election Commission of India ECI: 1991 Election Statistical Report
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Constituency wise results

Analysis

The AIADMK coalition won a massive victory in this election capturing 225 of 234 seats. The DMK coalition was routed with only 7 victories. DMK itself could win only 2 seats including that of its leader

M. Karunanidhi Muthuvel Karunanidhi (3 June 1924 – 7 August 2018) was an Indian writer and politician who served as Chief Minister of Tamil Nadu for almost two decades over five terms between 1969 and 2011. He was popularly referred to as Kalaignar (Art ...

. Though Karunanidhi won from the Harbour constituency, he resigned his seat immediately. The victory of AIADMK-Congress has been attributed mainly to the sympathy wave following the Rajiv Gandhi assassination. Other factors which helped their victory were the consolidation of the AIADMK votes under the unified AIADMK party, successful projection by Jayalalithaa as the true political heir to M. G. Ramachandran (M.G.R), successful portrayal of DMK as anti-woman (by playing up the events in the Assembly on 25 March 1989) and the PMK cutting into the DMK's vote bank in the northern districts. This election saw the first electoral success of the PMK, when its candidate ''Panruti'' Ramachandran was elected from the Panruti constituency.

References

External links

Election Commission of India
{{Tamil Nadu assembly elections, state=expanded State Assembly elections in Tamil Nadu 1990s in Tamil Nadu

June 1991 events in Asia