10 things to know about ‘Singham Anna’ K Annamalai, BJP's Coimbatore candidate in Lok Sabha election
K Annamalai joined the police force in 2011 and quit in 2019. An engineering graduate, Annamalai studied management from IIM-Lucknow.
BJP's Tamil Nadu chief K Annamalai will make his Lok Sabha election debut as he has been fielded as BJP's candidate from the Coimbatore Lok Sabha constituency. A prominent face in BJP's south advent, K Annamalai's name featured on the third list of the party that was released on Thursday. This is not Annamalai's first election; he lost to DMK's R Elango in the Tamil Nadu Assembly election in 2021. Annamalai has an interesting background as a supercop before he took the political plunge.
10 things to know about K Annamalai
1. The 39-year-old became the youngest BJP president in Tamil Nadu in 2021.
2. Annamalai joined the BJP in 2020 and rose in the ranks fast as the BJP wanted to gain a foothold in Tamil Nadu using Annamalai's reach to the youth. In the 2021 assembly election, he was fielded from Aravakurichi which he lost.
3. A 2011-batch IPS officer of the Karnataka cadre, Annamalai was the police superintendent of Chikkamagaluru and Udupi districts. He was also the deputy police commissioner in Bengaluru (south)
4. Annamalai quit the police service in September 2019.
5. Annamalai was an engineering graduate who studied MBA from IIM-Lucknow.
6. During his stint with the police force, Annamalai was called 'Singham anna' because of his working style.
7. When Annamalai was posted in Udupi, he decided to study Islam to understand the misinterpretation of the religious texts. He said he studied Quran and Hadith with the help of religious scholars to understand the philosophy.
8. Why did Annamalai leave the police service? In his resignation letter, Annamalai wrote that it was not a sudden decision but a trip to Kailash Mansarovar in 2018 made him look back at his life.
9. In 2023, Annamalai led En Mann En Makkal (My land, My people) yatra across the state
10. Annamalai is hailed as a rising star of the BJP. Known for his oratory, his speeches often go viral the latest being one on artificial intelligence.
