J. Jayalalithaa

• Early life and education
• Electoral history
• Recognitions
• Death
• Memorial

Electoral Performance

• Rajya Sabha elections
  • 1984

• Assembly elections

• • 1989
  • 1991
  • 1996
  • 2001
  • 2006
  • 2011
  • 2016

Film career and Literary work

• Filmography
• Discography
• Literary works

• Tamil Nadu Council of Ministers
  • Jayalalithaa I
  • Jayalalithaa II

• • Jayalalithaa III
  • Jayalalithaa IV
  • Jayalalithaa V
  • Jayalalithaa VI

• Tamil Nadu Legislative Assembly
  • Tenth
  • Twelfth
  • Fourteenth
  • Fifteenth

• 1989 attack on J. Jayalalithaa
• 1992 Kumbakonam Mahamaham stampede
• 1992 Vachathi Incident
• 1992 Acid Attack on V.S. Chandralekha
• 1996 Colour TV case
• 1998 TANSI land deal case
• Disproportionate assets case
• 2000 Pleasant Stay hotel case

• 2000 Dharmapuri bus burning
• 2001 Midnight Arrest of M. Karunanidhi
• 2004 Kumbakonam School fire
• 2004 Arrest of Kanchi Shankaracharya
• 2014 Chennai building collapse

• 2004 Earthquake and Tsunami
• 2005 November Chennai stampede
• 2005 December Chennai stampede
• 2015 Chennai Floods

Jayaram Jayalalithaa (24 February 1948 – 5 December 2016), popularly known as Amma, was an Indian politician and actress who served as the Chief Minister of Tamil Nadu for six terms spanning more than fourteen years between 1991 and 2016. She was the longest-serving General Secretary of the All India Anna Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (AIADMK) and the first female chief minister to die in office in India. Regarded as one of the most influential politicians of post-independence India, she was also a prominent film actress, appearing in nearly 140 films between 1961 and 1980 in Tamil, Telugu, Malayalam and Kannada cinema, and winning multiple Tamil Nadu State Film Awards and Filmfare Awards South.

Before entering politics, Jayalalithaa rose to prominence as a leading film actress in the mid-1960s, earning recognition for her versatility and classical dance skills. In 1982, she joined the AIADMK, founded by her frequent co-star M. G. Ramachandran (MGR), who was the Chief Minister. She rose swiftly within the party to become its Propaganda Secretary and was elected to the Rajya Sabha. After MGR's death in 1987, she outmanoeuvred the rival faction led by his widow V. N. Janaki to emerge as the party's sole leader.

Jayalalithaa first became Chief Minister in 1991, making her Tamil Nadu's youngest at the time. Her tenures were marked by strong centralisation of power, an extensive social-welfare agenda—most visibly the Amma-branded subsidised canteens, bottled water, salt, and cement—and an at-times ruthless posture towards political opponents. Her career was punctuated by serious legal difficulties: the DMK government led by M. Karunanidhi, her bête noire, filed 28 corruption cases against her after the 1996 election, and she was convicted in a disproportionate assets case in 2014. Each time, she was eventually acquitted and returned to office. In the 2016 assembly election, she became the first Tamil Nadu chief minister since MGR in 1984 to be voted back into power.

In September 2016, Jayalalithaa fell severely ill and was hospitalized for 75 days before passing away from cardiac arrest on 5 December 2016 and became the first female chief minister in India to die in office. She never married and had no children. Critics accused her of fostering a personality cult and demanding absolute loyalty from party legislators and ministers.