NTK chief S Seeman.
Credit: X/@Seeman4TN
Chennai: Naam Tamizhar Katchi (NTK), a Tamil nationalist outfit, headed to the April 19 Lok Sabha elections with all odds stacked against it. The 14-year-old party faced the arduous task of taking its new election symbol - mic - to the electorate in all 39 parliament constituencies after having lost its popular symbol (sugarcane farmer) to a lesser known outfit.
But when the results came out on June 4, NTK posted the best performance by smaller parties garnering an impressive vote share of 8.1 per cent, though all its candidates forfeited their deposits. NTK’s biggest takeaway this election will, however, be the impressive vote percentage making it eligible for recognition as a state political party.
It was founded by S Seeman, a self-proclaimed supporter of LTTE founder Velupillai Prabhakaran, in 2010 after the end of the civil war in Sri Lanka. NTK’s vote share has only witnessed a steady increase in every election after the party made its debut in electoral politics in 2016.
From a mere 1 per cent vote share in 2016, they increased it to 3.8 per cent in 2019 to a further 6.7 per cent in 2021. They were able to amass 8.1 per cent of votes in 2024. NTK, which projects itself as an alternative to the Dravidian major, has indeed come a long way.
Not just the percentage - as many as 12 NTK candidates secured more than 1 lakh votes, while 7 others garnered anywhere between 90,000 to 1 lakh votes. NTK nominee from Sivaganga raked in the highest number of votes (1.63 lakh), with the party performing well in rural areas, especially in southern and central parts of Tamil Nadu.
In many seats, the votes polled by NTK candidates did bring down the margin of winning candidates from the DMK alliance. While the jury on whether NTK can emerge as an alternative to Dravidian parties is yet to be out, the party certainly seems to be one of the top choices for an average first-time voter who doesn’t want to vote for either of the Dravidian majors, DMK and AIADMK.
Field visits by DH during the Lok Sabha campaign period revealed that for a first-time voter, all that mattered was a leader who could be trusted - Seeman, with his impeccable oratory skills, ticked all the boxes. Seeman’s fiery speeches where he whips up linguistic passion are widely circulated by NTK fans often making them go viral on social media platforms.
"Seeman’s ideas are implementable and he strikes the right chord with people like me. His candidates should get a chance at least once", Rigash had told DH in April in Kanniyakumari. Political analysts claimed NTK drawing over 8 per cent votes is a significant development as the party didn’t have much resources like their politically entrenched rivals but yet it took the new symbol to the electorate in just a month and made them come to polling booths.
The party's performance has always been viewed with caution as NTK is arguably the most controversial political party in Tamil Nadu for its extreme views on several issues.
From eulogising Velupillai Prabhakaran, slain chief of the now defunct LTTE and an accused in the eyes of the Indian law for his involvement in the assassination of Rajiv Gandhi, to advocating political power "only for native Tamils" to an "alternative economy" - some of the polices are either impractical or absurd.
However, Prof Ramu Manivannan, who taught history at the University of Madras, told DH that it is the political frustration of the people that pushes them towards NTK, which is neither a constructive nor a creative political alternative to Tamil Nadu.
"A lot of factors contribute to NTK’s increasing vote share. The lack of credible candidates from established political parties is one reason that I believe people go for options like the NTK. It is also the frustration with the system that forces people to vote for NTK", Manivannan added.
Seeman shot into limelight in late 2009 after the end of the civil war in Sri Lanka that ended around 70,000 lives, triggering him to preach Tamil nationalism. His rich oratory skills kept his audience captivated for hours together as he attacked the two Dravidian parties, particularly DMK. As his popularity rose, Seeman tested his electoral prowess for the first time in 2016, and the graph has has been on the rise ever since.