Bharatiya Janata Party ( BJP) candidate for Coimbatore constituency K. Annamalai filed his nomination on Wednesday.
After visiting the Koniamman temple in the city, he arrived at the Collectorate and was accompanied by Coimbatore south MLA Vanathi Srinivasan and BJP district general secretary J. Ramesh. Mr. Annamalai submitted his papers to the Election Officer Kranthi Kumar Pati.
He later told the media that the BJP is confident of winning more than 400 seats this year at the Centre and that will include the representative from Coimbatore. “We will stand by the people of Coimbatore and work for its people,” he said.
The DMK and the AIADMK have joined hands to fight the BJP and, “Our fight is against those stopping (Coimbatore’s) development or selling ganja...the incumbent MP of Coimbatore had not taken up in the parliament the problems faced by Coimbatore industries,” he said.
Asked about the remarks of the AIADMK candidate that Mr. Annamalai was not a son of the soil, he said that he came to Coimbatore in 2002 to study engineering and his wife is from Coimbatore. People from different parts of the State have set up industries here, he said.
“We don’t talk of minorities or majority here. Coimbatore has the risk of being targetted by fundamentalists and extremists and the State and Central governments should protect all the people here,” he said.
According to the details submitted by Mr. Annamalai, his annual income in 2022-2023 was ₹20.51 lakh and he has immovable assets worth ₹1.12 crore. He has 24 FIRs registered against him.