Politics has knocked out glamorous cricket from the betting arena as people are putting money, property, cars, two-wheelers and even gold and silver at stake in the betting game

Move over 20-20 IPL cricket, when it comes to betting the Indian Political League, Tamil Nadu edition is here. Politics has replaced the cricketing craze for the past few days and even the betting community has turned its focus on TN assembly elections that present a plethora of permutations and combinations and pulsating contest between two strong rivals – the AIADMK and DMK – with sundry other players queering the pitch.

Counting of votes is to begin at 8 a.m. Thursday Which way the pitch would turn is anybody’s guess, which is the stuff that the betting game thrives on. This unpredictability has the pollsters in a quandary as predicting the outcome is fraught with risk – any prediction has the tendency to go wrong when there are several hitherto absent variables – new political forces spoiling the game for the biggies but whom they would hit more is something that even these smaller parties like the PWF-DMDK-TMC combine, the BJP (with due apologies to its national stature), and Pattali Makkal Katchi – all of whom cannot win more than two or three seats individually, if at all, but can spoil the chances of either of the two Dravidian majors.

Now this uncertainty has the punters happy as they are taking bets on a wide range of poll aspects – who will win? Whether Jayalalithaa will break alternating trend? Will Karuna make a comeback? Whether Vijayakanth can win? And if Anbumani Ramadoss wins, what will be margin of victory to name a few. And the possibilities are endless as betting is on at the constituency level as well, with local factors drawing masses to this game of chance, though illegal but immensely popular.

For sure, in the election season, political league has ejected IPL cricket from the peeople’s mindspace if the betting scene is any indication – with large amounts of cash and kind being pawned in the high stakes game.

Moreover, given that the results are just a few hours away, curiosity is also driving those betting, which cuts across class barriers. Only the wagers change depending on the class – from a few hundrd rupees to few thousands to upwards of lakhs. Then then are people, according to reports, who are placing their properties, lands, vehicles and even gold and silver ornaments. At TASMAC shops even beer bottles are good currency for betting.

With the exit polls giving victories to both the AIADMK and the DMK the curiosity about reality is only increasing and this interest is also visible in the betting, said to be going on.