The Fifteenth Legislative Assembly Election was held on 16 May 2016 for the 232 seats (except Thanjavur and Aravakurichi for which held on 26 October 2016) of the Legislative Assembly in the state of Tamil Nadu in India. The AIADMK under J. Jayalalithaa won the elections and became the first ruling party to be re-elected in Tamil Nadu since 1984, though with a simple majority. The DMK won half of the seats it contested but its allies performed poorly; notably, the Indian National Congress won 16% of the seats they contested, and the alliance lost due to its poor performance. The votes were counted on 19 May 2016. In the previous election in 2011, AIADMK had, under the leadership of Jayalalithaa, won a thumping majority and formed the government, while DMDK chief Vijayakanth served as the Leader of Opposition until January 2016. 5 ministers from the outgoing cabinet were defeated in their respective constituencies. This was the last election that J. Jayalalithaa and M. Karunanidhi would contest, as they died later in 2016 and 2018, respectively.
Background
By the requirement, state assembly election must be held at an interval of five years or whenever it is dissolved by the president. The previous election, to the 14th legislative assembly, was conducted 13 April 2011 and its term would have naturally expired on 22 May 2016. The election to the 15th legislative assembly was organised and conducted by the Election Commission of India (ECI) and was held in a single phase on 16 May 2016. There were over 5.79 crore voters in the electoral rolls and 65,616 polling stations in Tamil Nadu.
A special purification drive of electoral rolls between 15 and 29 February 2016 in all poll-bound States including Tamil Nadu was held, in which door-to-door verification was undertaken involving booth-level agents. On 12 February 2016, Election Commission of India announced that 17 assembly constituencies in Tamil Nadu will have Voter-verified paper audit trail (VVPAT) machines attached along with EVMs. Voter-verified paper audit trail (VVPAT) machines will be in place in 4,000 booths.
Assembly constituencies of Tamil Nadu having VVPAT facility with EVMs Anna Nagar Vellore Krishnagiri Salem North Erode West Tirupur (North)Coimbatore North Dindigul Tiruchirappalli WestCuddalore Thanjavur KancheepuramVillupuram Madurai East ThoothukudiTirunelveli Kanyakumari
Demographics At the 2011 India census, Tamil Nadu had a population of 7,21,47,030. A total of 1,44,38,445 people constituting 20.01% of the total population belonged to Scheduled Castes (SC) and 7,94,697 people constituting 1.10% of the population belonged to Scheduled tribes (ST). Other Backward Classes (OBCs) form 68% of the population. As per the religious census of 2011, Tamil Nadu had 87.6% Hindus, 5.9% Muslims, 6.1% Christians, 0.1% Jains and 0.3% following other religions or no religion.
Schedule
The elections were held on 6 May 2016, with vote counting taking place on 19 May. The elections in Kerala and Puducherry also took place on 16 May but polling in two of the Tamil Nadu constituencies was postponed due to reports of voters being bribed.
EventDate Date for Nominations 22 April 2016 Last Date for filing Nominations 29 April 2016 Date for scrutiny of nominations 30 April 2016 Last date for withdrawal of candidatures 2 May 2016 Date of poll 16 May 2016 Date of counting 19 May 2016 Date before which the election shall be completed 21 May 2016
Campaign to vote To ensure that the electorate exercise their right to vote, the Election Commission of India (ECI) launched their own campaign in Tamil Nadu. The Chief Electoral Officer for the Tamil Nadu assembly elections, Rajesh Lakhoni, utilised social media platforms by creating memes and tweets themed around films, which have a huge reach in Tamil Nadu. Additionally, the Election Commission also recruited media personalities Suriya, Ashwin and Karthik, whose campaigning videos were filmed and shared on social media. The Election Commission also partnered with Twitter(X) for the first time in India, to boost its #TN100Percent hashtag campaign. Twitter users who have made use of the hashtag will be reminded to vote on the day of voting. Twitter and Facebook collaborated with ECI in its awareness campaign on striving for 100 per cent voting in the polls.
Parties and Alliances
Party/Alliance SymbolLeaderContesting seats Rowspan="7" AIADMK-led Alliance J. Jayalalithaa227 Manithaneya Jananayaga KatchiThamimum Ansari2 C. K. Thamizharasan1R. Sarathkumar1 Tamil Nadu Kongu Ilaingar PeravaiU. Thaniyarasu1 Mukkulathor PulipadaiKarunas1 Tamil Maanila Muslim LeagueSheik Dawood1 Rowspan="8" Democratic Progressive Alliance M. Karunanidhi176E. V. K. S. Elangovan41K. M. Khader Mohideen5 M. H. Jawahirullah4 Dr. K. Krishnasamy4 N. R. Dhanapalan1 Tamil Nadu Peasants and Workers PartyPon. Kumar1 Samuga Samathuva PadaiV. Sivakami1People's Welfare FrontVijayakanth105 Vaiko28 G. K. Vasan 26Mutharasan25Communist Party of India (Marxist)G. Ramakrishnan25 Thol. Thirumavalavan25 Rowspan="3" National Democratic Alliance Tamilisai Soundararajan165Inthiya Makkal Kalvi Munnetra KazhagamT. Devanathan Yadav24 T. R. Paarivendhar45
Parties not in any coalition +Sl. No:Name of the PartyParty SymbolParty Leader1 All India Majlis-e-Ittehadul Muslimeen Asaduddin Owaisi2Anaithu Makkal Munnetra Kazhagam Pachathanni Manickam I.P.S3 Kongunadu Makkal Desia Katchi E.R. Eswaran4Social Democratic Party of India Thehlan Baqavi5Pattali Makkal Katchi Anbumani Ramadoss6Naam Tamizhar Katchi Senthamizhan Seeman7 Tamizhaga Vazhvurimai Katchi Panruti T. Velmurugan8Welfare Party of India S. N. Sikkandar
Candidates On 4 April, AIADMK released its candidate list for Tamil Nadu. On 14 April, DMK released its candidate list for Tamil Nadu.
Gopi Shankar Madurai, a 25 years old gender activist made a bid to contest as one of the youngest candidates in the Tamil Nadu Assembly election and also the first openly Intersex & Genderqueer person to do so. Gopi contested on the ticket of newly launched outfit Anaithu Makkal Munnetra Kazhagam for Madurai North. He secured 14th place out of 21 candidates. List of Candidates