Chennai,  After the loss in the 2021 elections, the first outburst against the AIADMK-BJP alliance has come from former minister CVe Shanmugham, who has said that minority votes had gravitated away from the party leading to the drubbing.

Shanmugham while addressing a meeting of the party office bearers at Villupuram on Tuesday had said that the minority communities and several traditional vote banks of the AIADMK had left the party leading to its defeat.

The former minister said that the Villupuram Assembly constituency has 20,000 minority voters, including 18,000 in Villupuram town alone. He said that the party lost minority support due to the alliance with the BJP.

The senior leader also said that the DMK had won the elections not on its merit but due to the failure of the AIADMK to capitalise on its traditional votes. He said that the people wanted to continue with the AIADMK government but it was unfortunate that the minority and other traditional voters moved away from the front and the party could not come back to power.

The AIADMK had entered into a political alliance with the BJP in the 2021 Assembly elections but other than BJP winning four seats due to the alliance, it was a loss for the AIADMK.

S. Sivasankaran, senior journalist and activist from Madurai while speaking to IANS said, "The AIADMK and BJP were into an alliance of convenience and the signs of bickering have come out now with the statement of CVe Shanmugham. He is seen as a close confidant of K. Palaniswami and who has come out against Sasikala publicly. Shanmugham had approached the court that he had received death threats from the Sasikala camp after his statements against her."