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All in the family, as Tamil Nadu parties announce candidates for 2019 Lok Sabha elections, bye-elections

The family connections were on show on candidate lists across party lines.

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(Left to right) K Kanimozhi, Dayanidhi Maran, LK Sudhish and Anbumani Ramadoss.
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The lists of candidates announced so far by political parties in Tamil Nadu have seen a large number of seats allotted to family members of senior leaders. The AIADMK and DMK, which are the major parties in the state, have five candidates each with family connections.

The AIADMK and DMK are contesting 20 seats each of the 39 in the state, and have allotted the rest to their allies. The family connections of candidates is not limited to just the general elections to the Lok Sabha, but is also visible in the lists of candidates announced by the parties for the bye-elections to the 18 Assembly seats that will be up for grabs when Tamil Nadu votes on April 18.

The list of candidates announced by the DMK featured a number of family members. The most prominent of them was K Kanimozhi, daughter of late party chief M Karunanidhi and half-sister to its current chief MK Stalin. Kanimozhi is making her first electoral bid from the Tuticorin Lok Sabha constituency. She second term in the Rajya Sabha is set to end in July.

Another member of the expansive Karunanidhi family, Dayanidhi Maran, reclaimed his party ticket from Chennai Central. Dayanidhi is Karunanidhi's grand-nephew and son of former Union Minister Murasoli Maran. He has won from the constituency in 2004 and 2009, taking over after the death of his father, who won the constituency in 1996, 1998 and 1999.

The DMK also gave three other Lok Sabha tickets to the children of senior party leaders. It is fielding Tamizhachi Tangapandian in Chennai South, Kalanidhi Veerasamy in Chennai North and Gowtham Sigamani in Kallakurichi. They are the children of senior party leaders and former state ministers V Thangapandian, Arcot N Veerasamy and K Ponmudy respectively. Tamizhachi's bother Thangam Thennarasu is also a former DMK minister.

The family theme was also apparent in the lists of candidates announced by the AIADMK. P Ravindranath Kumar, son of Tamil Nadu Deputy Chief Minister and AIADMK coordinator O Panneerselvam, will make his electoral debut from the Theni constituency.

J Jayavardhan, the sitting MP from Chennai South, will return on the party ticket. He is the son of senior AIADMK leader and Tamil Nadu's current Fisheries Minister D Jayakumar. 

The AIADMK will field VVR Raj Sathyan, son of Madurai North MLA VV Rajan Chellappa, from the Madurai Lok Sabha constituency. The party's ticket for the Tirunelveli constituency has been given to Paul Manoj Pandian, son of senior leader PH Pandian. The party will also field S Jyothi in the bye-election to the Hosur Assembly constituency. She is the wife of convicted former minister P Balakrishna Reddy.

Not just the DMK and AIADMK, other parties too fielded some predictable candidates with family connections. The PMK, for instance, handed its ticket to the Dharmapuri constituency to Anbumani Ramadoss, son of party founder S Ramadoss. Anbumani is the sitting MP from the constituency, and served as Union Health Minister in UPA-I.

The DMDK, a party shadow run by the family of actor-turned-politician Vijayakanth, is fielding the leader's brother-in-law LK Sudhish from Kallakurichi.

In a handful of places, these candidates, will be going head to head, like the contests in Chennai South and Kallakurichi.

Other parties, which are yet to announce their lists of candidates for the 2019 Lok Sabha elections and the bye-elections to 18 Assembly constituencies too may well end up falling back on the family factor to try and seal victory in some seats.

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