Chennai, Feb 6 (BPNS)
In politics, there is no blood relationship and elections will be fought against father, mother, brother, or sister and in Tiruvannamalai district of Tamil Nadu, a mother and daughter are locked in a straight contest for the Urban local body elections.
Priya (32) filed her nomination papers from ward 18 in Vandavasi municipality of Tiruvannamalai district as an AIADMK candidate. Her husband, D. Arumugam (42) who runs a banner printing firm was the AIADMK candidate in the 2011 elections and he lost the seat for a wafer-thin margin of two votes. However, the 18th ward in the Vandavasi constituency was reserved for women and hence Arumugam who is currently with the Hindu Munnani could not contest. This led to Priya, getting the nomination.
A small difference of opinion with Priya led her mother, N. Kotteswari (58) to file the nomination papers as an independent candidate. Immediately after Kotteswari filed the nomination as an independent candidate, DMK extended her support. It may be noted that Priya’s husband, Arumugam had lost the seat by a margin of 2 votes to the Congress candidate, in 2011 when the Urban local body polls were last held. It is to be noted that Congress is in the DMK alliance and this gives Kotteswari the edge over Priya.
Priya and Arumugam were in fighting spirit and Arumugam while speaking to BPNS said, “In election, it is only the opponent. Relationships and friendships will not come in between if two close people are fighting the polls. We will fight with all our ammunition and I hope that my mother-in-law also utilizes all the means available for her.” He said that the fight will be interesting and the prime focus is to prevent families votes from being dropped into Kotteswari’s kitty.
With the Urban local body polls to be held on February 19th, the candidates are busy canvassing voters through door-to-door campaigning and the mother and daughter are at each other during the high voltage campaign for the council seat of Ward 18th of Vandavasi municipality.
