Amit Shah to visit Tamil Nadu in July to discuss 2026 poll strategies with alliance partners
For the third time in a row since April, Union Home Minister Amit Shah will visit Chennai on July 8 to meet the party’s newly appointed office bearers and interact with them to ensure cohesion within the party.
He is also expected to review the party’s preparedness for the 2026 Assembly general elections.
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According to BJP insiders, Shah is expected to meet AIADMK general secretary Edappadi K. Palanisami to discuss the poll strategy for the 2026 assembly general elections.
While the AIADMK has been fighting hard to make the alliance work at the ground level amid deep anti-BJP sentiments in Tamil Nadu, the BJP seems to have clearly laid out a 2026 plan for the state.
Sources say that Amit Shah will be in Chennai—tentatively by July 8—to meet the alliance's party leaders. It is said that he will also meet the PMK leaders Dr S. Ramadoss and his son Dr Anbumani Ramadoss, who are at loggerheads.
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Palanisami who operates from his ancestral house in Salem is expected to go around Tamil Nadu to meet the party cadres and rejuvenate the party. The AIADMK, since it lost power in 2021 has been completely down and under, losing all the elections and has witnessed several splits. Sources say that Palanisami is planning to visit all the 37 districts across the state, ahead of the elections and a detailed tour plan is being worked out.
“Our home minister has been mentioning about the liquor scam in Tamil Nadu whenever he is here. During his press conference in Chennai on April 11 and again during the public meeting in Madurai, he touched upon the liquor scam. He said it runs to ₹37,000 crores. Without a solid plan in mind, the home minister will not talk. Along with the AIADMK we will tell people that the DMK is corrupt and will defeat it,” a senior BJP leader told THE WEEK.
When in Madurai on June 8, Amit Shah had hinted at a coalition government, which had turned into a talking point and led to differences within the alliance.
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Sources say that during the next visit, Shah will pronounce strategies to have a smooth working relationship between the BJP and the AIADMK.
“It is said that our home minister will meet our own party seniors and tell them to work in unity. He hinted about this during the madurai conference,” a senior BJP leader explained.
The BJP in Tamil Nadu is going through an organisational rejig, after former IPS officer K. Annamalai was replaced by Nainar Nagendran as the party’s state president. The new office bearers are expected to assume office before Amit Shah’s visit.
India