BJP comes a cropper in TN elections

The 'Lotus' failed to bloom in the 2016 Assembly Elections in the state where it came a cropper losing all the 156 seats it had contested.

The party ahead of the polls made a tall claim of having enrolled close to 5 million members through the 'missed' call drive in the run up to the polls. 

The saffron party, which faced the polls alone, with some minor allies, however showed good growth in the northern, central and western belts.

The routing at the hustings was such that its candidates faced the ignominy of forfeiting deposits, in all but four constituencies, in their stronhghold of Kanniyakumari district, which had returned former State President and Union Minister Pon Radhakrishnan to the Lok Sabha in 2014--its only success, despite stitching together a grand alliance that included the DMDK led by actor-politician Vijayakanth, MDMK led by Vaiko, PMK of Dr S Ramadoss and minor allies like IJK and New Justice Party.

What's more BJP State unit President Ms Tamizhisai Soundararajan, H Raja and Ms Vanathi Srinivasan, who have contested from Virugambakkam, T.Nagar in Chennai  and Coimbatore South respectively, too forfeited their deposits.