Despite decades of quotas and reservations and a sustained movement against caste domination, caste has stubbornly refused to go away from Tamil politics. And it invariably surfaces during elections. As political parties roll out campaigns, caste outfits, too, are holding brainstorming sessions and charting strategies to consolidate votes that will benefit their communities.

With a clear understanding of the caste mix in each seat, parties choose candidates that will help leverage caste, as they do in the Hindi heartland. Given the possibility that most candidates in the fray for a particular seat may be from the same caste, caste outfits may seem redundant. But, many say such organisations do have a say in electoral poll outcomes.

‘‘It does not matter whether the political party fields the candidates from our community in constituencies where we form the majority. We want to see which party fields our men even in places where we are not present,’’ says Allur Srinivasan, Tiruchi district president of Pasumpon Makkal Munnetra Kazhagam, a Thevar outfit formed recently.

Thevars are numerically strong OBCs and, obviously, much higher in the caste hierarchy than the Dalits. Srinivasan points out that they analyse the importance given to their community at various levels in each party before deciding to vote for the candidate, if all the contestants were from their caste.

Caste and politics have been inexorably linked in Tamil Nadu over the years, initially centering on leaders from mainstream parties like Congress, which had a powerful leader in Kamraj, and who was seen as an icon of the Nadars. Subsequently, castes themselves gave rise to political parties.

The earliest leaders who used caste identity to mobilise support were the late S S Ramasamy Padayachi and Manickavelu Naicker, both from the Vanniyar caste, now designated ‘most backward’. They, as leaders of Vaniyar Sangham, were the progenitors of Patali Makkal Katchi, or PMK.

DMK emerged as an inclusive party of all ‘lower’ castes and, to some extent, weakened the political dependence on caste for mobilising votes, but even that party, and its offshoot, the AIADMK, have had to bear caste equations in mind on key issues like forming a representative Cabinet, allotting party tickets during elections and naming public institutions after various leaders.

In the upcoming Lok Sabha polls, delimitation may impact significantly on the caste factor. With urban areas getting more seats after delimitation — because population was the basis for the adjustment of constituency borders — the influence that some castes wield in certain constituencies may have been transformed.

For instance, Sriperumbudur, formerly reserved for Dalits, has not only been de-reserved, but has a predominantly urban profile. One reserved constituency in the western region (Rasipuram) does not even exist, but there is a new Scheduled Caste seat in the north (Villupuram) where the Vanniyars are strong. There have been some changes in south Tamil Nadu as well, impacting on the relevance of castes like the Thevars and Nadars and southern Dalit sects. While the effect of these changes will be seen only after the polls, some caste organisations are busy pushing their agenda. Some have extended support to one alliance or more.

The Bhargava Kula Sangam, an umbrella outfit of OBC Udayar, Moopanar and Nayanar communities, sent feelers to parties that it would back any party that fields more candidates from these castes. ‘‘We have not yet decided on any party. But we have met CM M Karunanidhi and appealed to him to field candidates in as many places as possible from our community,’’ said T Parivallal, youth wing secretary of the association.

The Mutharayars and Dalits, who form a large chunk of voters in central TN, are also waiting for their community leaders to find a place in the list, even as they continue to put pressure.