Although Jayalalithaa has suffered a deep legal blow, it would be foolish to write her off politically on this ground alone. She had faced similar challenges before and bounced back. Her hold on the party and the State remains undiminished
In the run-up to the 1986 FIFA World Cup football final rounds which were played at Mexico, Carlos Bilardo, the then manager of the Argentine national team, was asked about the composition of his team. “All I could say is that there will be Diego Maradona and 10 other players”, Bilardo replied. Argentina won the FIFA World Cup only because of the scintillating game dished out by Maradona. Bilardo had the same answer when he was sounded about the 1990 World Cup played at Italy.
J Jayalalithaa (66), the AIADMK general secretary and former Chief Minister of Tamil Nadu, has a lot of similarities with Bilardo and Maradona. To make it clear, Jayalalithaa is Bilardo and Maradona rolled into one. The AIADMK won the 1991, 2001 and 2011 Assembly elections only because of her. “A tsunami by name Jaya has struck the political landscape of Tamil Nadu”, was the observation by a political commentator in the aftermath of the 2014 lok Sabha election.
Following her conviction and sentencing in the disproportionate wealth case against her by a Special Court of Bangalore on September 27, Jayalalithaa lost her membership of the Tamil Nadu legislative Assembly and the chief ministership. She left ‘Veda Nilayam’, her Poes Garden residence in Chennai, on September 27 to Bangalore to be present during the pronouncement of the verdict. The judge sentenced her to four years imprisonment and a fine of Rs100 crore on the charges that she misused her position as Chief Minister of Tamil Nadu during 2001 to 2006 to amass wealth to the tune of Rs66 crore, which according to the prosecution was disproportionate to her known sources of income. Jayalalithaa was sent to the Parappana Agrahara Central Jail the same day, and she had to remain there as a prisoner for the next 21 days. She was granted bail by the Supreme Court with caveats and is back in her Poes Garden residence.
The case was filed in 1996 by senior BJP leader Subramanian Swamy who has had a love-hate relationship with Jayalalithaa. Though it was Mr Swamy who filed the case against her, he was instrumental in bringing Jayalalithaa to the national stage. Remember the 1999 ‘political tea party’ attended by Jayalalithaa and Ms Sonia Gandhi and which was organised by Mr Swamy. The event turned out to be a political earthquake which led to the collapse of the Vajpayee-led NDA Government.
Following her conviction in the disproportionate wealth case , many political commentators have written Jayalalithaa’s political obituary. The same political commentators had written off Jayalalithaa in 2000 when she was convicted in two other corruption cases by Special Courts in Chennai.
One of the cases dealt with the Tamil Nadu Small Industries Corporation. The prosecution’s charge was that during her tenure as Chief Minister from 1991 to 1996, Jayalalithaa caused pecuniary loss of nearly three crore rupees to the exchequer when she and her friend Sasikala Natarajan bought the land belonging to TANSI. The Special Court judge sentenced her to five years rigorous imprisonment . She was also convicted and sentenced by another Special Court for two years’ imprisonment in a case related to the granting of a licence to Pleasant Stay Hotel in Kodaikkanal for extending construction in violation of the environment laws. But she was acquitted of all charges in both the cases.
Commentators who ridiculed her by terming her ‘TANSI Rani’ in 2000 had to eat their words in 2001 when Jayalalithaa returned to power like a tornado. M Karunanidhi, who was in power as Chief Minister from 1996 to 2001, had everything at his disposal when the Election Commission declared the election to the State Assembly in May 2001. There wasn’t any anti-incumbency factor against MR Karunanidhi or the DMK. Opinion polls predicted that Mr Karunanidhi and the DMK would return to power. But it turned out to be a landslide win for Jayalalithaa. A person who was written off as a has-been by the commentators bounced back with vigour and energy.
Jayalalithaa may be out of the corridors of power from Fort Saint George, the Tamil Nadu secretariat. But the command post of Tamil Nadu politics has completely shifted to ‘Veda Nilayam’ at Poes Garden. Neither Chief Minister O Paneerselvam nor his colleagues in the Council of Ministers have qualms in declaring openly that power vests with their ‘Amma’. No other political leader in the country commands this much servility and loyalty from the cadre.
Veteran observers and political pundits speak about a political vacuum in Tamil Nadu following her conviction in the recent case. But they ignore the 2001 spectacle which saw Jayalalithaa rising like a phoenix from the ashes of corruption charges. The Special Court in Bangalore is just the beginning of a legal war. There are two more appellate courts in the country which will decide the future of Jayalalithaa. She may not be able to contest elections and be Chief Minister for now, but there is no rule in the country which prevents her from being the non-playing captain and coach-cum-manager of team AIADMK.
Opinions and assessments in Tamil Nadu about political personalities are prejudiced because of two factors. The Dravidian politics and cultural landscape are ‘known’ for their prejudice against women as well as Brahmins. Many political stalwarts and political scientists find it difficult to digest the fact that a woman could rise to the level Jayalalithaa has.
About the hatred the Dravidians have for the Brahmins, to a certain extent it is true that the Brahmins dominated the politics and the bureaucracy in the State. But that was long ago. With the voting-out of the Congress in the 1967 Assembly election, the Congress in the State and the hegemony of Brahmins were dead and buried for good.
The remnants of the Congress were finished off by Mr Karunanidhi himself, who aligned with the party at the invitation of Indira Gandhi in 1971. Indira Gandhi had one mission — to finish off K Kamaraj, in whom she saw a political threat. The free access Indira Gandhi gave to Mr Karunanidhi led to the burial of the Tamil Nadu Congress Committee. She aligned with Mr Karunanidhi’s DMK without taking into confidence the State unit of her party.
If there appears now a political vacuum in Tamil Nadu, it is the fall-out of the weakening of the DMK. Who will occupy the position once dominated by the DMK, is the question everybody is struggling to find an answer. The DMK is not in a position to win an election on its own, and hence, needs allies. The 2016 Assembly election could be a watershed event in the political history of Tamil Nadu. The DMK may have to agree to share power with an ally to give the AIADMK a run for its money. With the launch of a number of public welfare schemes, all named after Brand Amma, the AIADMK is in an invincible position, despite Jayalalithaa’s conviction.