Chennai: Eyeing for a “massive” electoral victory in the 2016 Assembly polls, AIADMK supremo and Tamil Nadu Chief Minister J Jayalalithaa on Friday urged her supporters to work for a “grander” mandate than all those achieved so far by the party in various elections.
In her message to party workers ahead of its 44th Founding Day tomorrow, Jayalalithaa reiterated her commitment towards people’s welfare, saying she did not have a family or other personal expectations and that her primary focus was the welfare of the state.
“We have a responsibility of ensuring more victories for AIADMK. In the coming Assembly polls, AIADMK should net a grander victory than those achieved earlier,” she said.
Ensuring such a victory would be the way party workers could show their gratitude for AIADMK founder M G Ramachandran (MGR) (also her political mentor), she said.
The party’s 44th year founding day celebrations should serve as a platform from where its elected members and senior leaders should reach out to the people with the achievements of the government led by “your loving sister,” she said.
“Work with the sole aim of securing victory. Let your efforts enhance the popularity of MGR. It is my affectionate order that efforts to secure this (grander) win should be started in this year’s founding day celebrations,” she said.
Jayalalithaa said she had no family nor any personal expectations and that she was dedicated to the party and the people of Tamil Nadu, whose welfare was her only objective.
“I realised that I live for you (the people). I accept this life as a call from God,” she said.
Recalling the circumstances leading to the founding of the party by Ramachandran in 1972, she said he had heeded people’s “unanimous call” to float an alternative to the “evil force”, in an apparent reference to the M Karunanidhi-led DMK.
Ramachandran, an actor-politician, was till then a member of DMK.
Jayalalithaa said she had to face a lot of “challenges and conspiracies” following MGR’s death and had worked hard to ensure that AIADMK continued to remain a “people’s movement.”
In its over four decades of existence, AIADMK saw a split after the death of MGR in 1987 and witnessed both ups and downs in its journey over the years.
AIADMK has 151 MLAs in the 234-member Tamil Nadu Assembly and has been on a winning streak since assuming power in 2011.
Last year, it had routed DMK in the Lok Sabha polls by winning 37 of the 39 seats with BJP and its ally PMK winning the rest. The party has not lost a single bypoll and has won the civic polls as well.