A month after the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) failed to win a single seat in the Tamil Nadu Lok Sabha elections, the party’s state chief K Annamalai may take an sabbatical to the UK for a fellowship programme.
BJP sources said the three-month fellowship at Oxford University had been planned for some time and Annamalai had decided to take leave even before the results were out.
The Chebining Gurukul Fellowship for Leadership and Excellence, a programme designed for “young leaders and mid-career professionals with significant leadership potential”, will begin in mid-September and conclude in December. Annamalai has reportedly approached the high command for permission to accept the fellowship.
Annamalai is High-profile House of Representatives election campaign In Tamil Nadu, Prime Minister Narendra Modi and other BJP leaders have been frequent visitors to the state, which has long been the party’s nurturing centre. Annamalai, an IPS officer turned politician, was elected Tamil Nadu BJP chief over several senior leaders but lost in his own constituency, Coimbatore.
But sources said the party has not lost faith in its 39-year-old leader, whose aggressive style is believed to have given the BJP a strong foothold in Tamil Nadu, where the BJP-led NDA came second in 12 of the state’s 39 Lok Sabha seats, propelling the AIADMK to third place.
BJP leaders said Annamalai was keen to take up the fellowship and saw it as a break to help him recharge his batteries after the elections and the state-wide ‘En Mann, En Makkal’ march that preceded it. An aide to Annamalai said: “The average politician lives his life wearing white from dawn to dusk and attending weddings, funerals, temples and party meetings. Annamalai wants to do something different. He believes this break will help in the larger scheme of things.”
The BJP leader said the adjournment should not be taken as a post-election result message: “This is Annamalai’s own decision and the party is not seeking to reinstate him or expel him.”
At the same time, the party chief admitted that Annamalai is “a bit unhappy” about a number of things, including “lack of cooperation from senior leaders” and general support among the state government and central leaders that the BJP should contest the 2026 state elections in an alliance.
Annamalai had been pushing for the BJP to run on its own, and her comments attacking AIADMK leader and former Prime Minister J. Jayalalithaa were one of the major catalysts for the BJP to cut ties with the party ahead of the Lok Sabha elections.
Annamalai applied for the Chebining Gurukul Fellowship, a 12-week residential course at Oxford University, offered by the British Foreign Office, earlier this year and reportedly had an interview in Delhi in May.
