The All India Majlis-e-Ittehadul Muslimeen chief Asaduddin Owaisi said on Saturday that his party will support the All India Anna Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam, or AIADMK, in the coming Lok Sabha elections and state Assembly elections in Tamil Nadu.

“AIADMK has refused to ally with BJP [Bharatiya Janata Party] and has committed to never allying with it in the future,” said Owaisi in a social media post announcing his decision to ally with the Dravidian party. “It has also assured that it will oppose CAA [Citizenship Amendment Act], NPR [National Population Register] and NRC [National Register of Citizens.”

In August, the AIADMK officially ended its alliance with the BJP and walked out from the National Democratic Alliance. The Dravidian party had said that the decision honours the sentiments and aspirations of its over 2 crore workers.

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The party had entered the NDA ahead of the 2019 Lok Sabha elections.

In January, party leader D Jayakumar reiterated that the AIADMK would not ally with the BJP.

Jayakumar also said that BJP state president K Annamalai had been giving more importance to himself rather than his party. “Annamalai is making statements about things that never happened to divert attention, but this ploy would not work,” the AIADMK leader said, according to The Hindu.

The AIADMK severed ties with the BJP days after it criticised Annamalai for his comments about former Chief Minister CN Annadurai.

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“Annadurai had in the 1950s made a critical remark against the Hindu faith at a programme in Madurai which was staunchly opposed by freedom fighter Pasumpon Muthumarlinga Thevar,” Annamalai had said.

Annadurai founded the Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam in 1949 and formed the first non-Congress government in Tamil Nadu in 1967. He was the political mentor of MG Ramachandran, who founded the AIADMK in 1972 and named his party after Annadurai.

Also read: How an ideological battle led to the AIADMK-BJP split