Hours of campaigning in the blistering heat has taken a toll on Vanathi Srinivasan, but she was upbeat on Wednesday as the BJP candidate for Coimbatore South released her manifesto for the constituency. "I would make the whole constituency wifi-enabled," she reads from the manifesto.
The bilingual booklet promises better education, health, social security, infrastructure development, sports and environment protection.
The manifesto is not the only reason for cheer. She has been receiving an overwhelming response during her campaign, giving BJP hope that they might be able to upset the Dravidian applecart in at least this constituency. AIADMK candidate Amman Arjunan is getting a cold response and DMK has ceded the seat to ally Congress' Mayura Jayakumar, all raising the BJP's prospects.
Coimbatore South, which has a large north Indian population and Vilavancode in Kanyakumari are the only two safe seats for BJP is Tamil Nadu. So there was a clamour to contest from Coimbatore.
"Of the 3,000-odd applications for tickets, 360 were from Coimbatore," says state executive committee member R Nandhakumar.
With BJP president Amit Shah scheduled to campaign in the city, Srinivasan's chances are likely to improve further. Coimbatore, with a large working class population, was a Communist stronghold till the DMK and AIADMK took over. Over the last 20 years, however, BJP has been gaining ground on the back of communal tensions and widening its base.
BJP's C P Radhakrishnan won the Lok Sabha polls in 1998 and 1999 as an ally of AIADMK and DMK. But in the 2014 parliamentary elections when BJP floated its own front without the two major parties too, Radhakrishnan bagged 3.8 lakh votes, just 42,000 votes fewer than the winning AIADMK candidate, but 1.7 lakh votes more than the DMK candidate.
"Even in the mayor elections when we contested alone, our candidate bagged 1.2 lakh votes," says a BJP member.
Though rivals caution that these numbers should be taken with a pinch of salt, as DMK backed out of mayor elections, allowing some of its votes to go to BJP, the numbers point to the fact that the saffron party has managed to create its own voter base in Coimbatore.
The bilingual booklet promises better education, health, social security, infrastructure development, sports and environment protection.
The manifesto is not the only reason for cheer. She has been receiving an overwhelming response during her campaign, giving BJP hope that they might be able to upset the Dravidian applecart in at least this constituency. AIADMK candidate Amman Arjunan is getting a cold response and DMK has ceded the seat to ally Congress' Mayura Jayakumar, all raising the BJP's prospects.
Coimbatore South, which has a large north Indian population and Vilavancode in Kanyakumari are the only two safe seats for BJP is Tamil Nadu. So there was a clamour to contest from Coimbatore.
"Of the 3,000-odd applications for tickets, 360 were from Coimbatore," says state executive committee member R Nandhakumar.
With BJP president Amit Shah scheduled to campaign in the city, Srinivasan's chances are likely to improve further. Coimbatore, with a large working class population, was a Communist stronghold till the DMK and AIADMK took over. Over the last 20 years, however, BJP has been gaining ground on the back of communal tensions and widening its base.
BJP's C P Radhakrishnan won the Lok Sabha polls in 1998 and 1999 as an ally of AIADMK and DMK. But in the 2014 parliamentary elections when BJP floated its own front without the two major parties too, Radhakrishnan bagged 3.8 lakh votes, just 42,000 votes fewer than the winning AIADMK candidate, but 1.7 lakh votes more than the DMK candidate.
"Even in the mayor elections when we contested alone, our candidate bagged 1.2 lakh votes," says a BJP member.
Though rivals caution that these numbers should be taken with a pinch of salt, as DMK backed out of mayor elections, allowing some of its votes to go to BJP, the numbers point to the fact that the saffron party has managed to create its own voter base in Coimbatore.