Naam Tamilar Katchi’s impressive performance in last year’s State Assembly election in which it secured around 6.58% votes surprised political observers , but its slump to a dismal 1.60% vote share and failing to win a single seat in the recently held urban local bodies election has put the party in the spot of bother.
Though the party cadres and its leader, Seeman, consistently claim the party enjoys considerable support from voters despite not paying a penny to them because of ‘ideologically committed’ supporters, the party leadership has been forced to contemplate whether its support base is being eroded.
The party’s young second line leadership claims distribution of money to voters by Dravidian parties, local influence of caste and caste leaders, fielding young (and not-so-popular) candidates and inability to field candidates across majority of the seats were some of the reasons why the party faced a slump.
