“I had not imagined losing the election,” DMK leader and Tamil Nadu’s former Finance minister Palanivel Thiaga Rajan (PTR) said about his electoral defeat in Madurai Central, in a lengthy reflective note posted on social media on Monday, May 18.
PTR said that he had believed that the work he did would win him another term as a legislator, adding, “I can confidently say that one cannot go more than 500 metres in any part of my constituency without finding some evidence of my impact, and my work has positively touched the life of every person in my constituency in some way.”
However, he said he was glad that he lost to someone who did not bribe voters.
Madhar Badhurudeen of the Tamiliaga Vettri Kazhagam (TVK) won the Madurai Central constituency with 63,414 votes and a 19,128 vote margin.
PTR wrote, “I am happy that I lost to the candidate who did not pay cash for votes or spread false propaganda and beat the candidate who paid 1,000 per vote by a hefty margin.” He added, “I am proud that I stuck to my principle of not paying for votes, despite losing the election.”
The leader attributed his electoral defeat to anti-incumbency sentiments. “The wave that engulfed me was not fueled by caste, or religion, or even money. Till 2026, the DMK and its allies had won five elections in a row in Madurai Central ... We were sure to face the consequences of anti-incumbency at some point, and I accept the loss with humility,” he wrote.
PTR began the note by saying that when he entered electoral politics a decade ago, he had said that he would exit after 10 years, when he turned 60. However, he chose to defer his original plans and contest the 2026 elections because he “could not close out many of the initiatives and projects” that he started.
Now that he has been voted out of power, PTR said he would take a few weeks’ break from public life to attend to personal commitments he had put off during his busy schedule as an MLA and minister. “After 10 years as an MLA, which was (collectively with my team) a constant responsibility irrespective of day and time, I am looking forward to a few weeks of time off of life as a private citizen wholly in control of my time and schedule. Many requests to visit and give talks across India, which I could not afford the time for earlier, can now be accepted.”
He also said he would use the time to work on a book deal he had signed earlier and take care of his health.
The four-page note also listed the many projects he completed as a party worker, MLA, minister, and GST council member.
He wrote, “My leader asked me to form the DMK IT Wing in 2017 ... Traveling thousands of kilometres across the state multiple times, we created the youngest and most qualified new wing of the party at the time.”
The list of his contributions to the Madurai Central constituency included the completion of over 250 MLA CDS projects, smart classes with CSR funds in every corporation school in the constituency, an MLA call centre, and several developments in the health sector, among others.
He also wrote, “While I was Finance Minister, we funded several large infrastructure projects in Madurai, including the Goripalayam and Vandiyur fly-over bridges, the Vandiyur Park, and the Subramaniapuram 9-floor UHB development … I also obtained CSR funding from major banks like HDFC and Corporations like HCL and St Gobain to expand the morning breakfast scheme to all students (irrespective of grade) in any school getting elementary school breakfast.”
As finance minister, PTR said he was able to deliver “the best fiscal improvement in the history of Tamil Nadu”. He cited “massive revenue deficit reduction two years in a row despite COVID wave 2 and wave 3, and lower borrowing in INR terms than the prior year (that is, irrespective of inflation and the scale of the economy or the budget) for two years in a row.” He added that such an achievement was unprecedented.
PTR also said that during his time as a member of the GST council, he was “a clear voice to ensure Tamil Nadu's (and indeed all states' rights) were safeguarded. My inputs … have been cited in landmark court judgements on GST.”
He also listed a number of contributions he made to the state during his term as the IT minister. PTR added that his team would put out detailed statements on his contributions, especially constituency-specific ones, in the coming days.
While stating that he “never saw a scenario in which [TVK] would get to 35% [vote share],” PTR also wished the new TVK government under Chief MInister C Joseph Vijay success, and urged them not to give in to “inertia.”
“Use the great opportunity of a new beginning, a clean slate, to boldly drive reform in every aspect of the way the government functions. Without such an approach, I am afraid they will fall further behind, rather than deliver progress,” he wrote.