J Jayalalithaa stamps her authority in RS poll
It is often difficult to decipher the moves of seasoned politicians, and one has to do much reading between the lines to make sense of their decisions. Therefore, when Tamil Nadu Chief Minister J Jayalalithaa decided not to transfer her party's surplus votes in favour of the DMDK candidate in the just held Rajya Sabha election from Tamil Nadu, eyebrows were raised. The move helped her arch rival DMK's Kanimozhi to sail through. Had Ms Jayalalithaa transferred those votes to the DMDK, the result could have been different and Ms Kanimozhi might not have made it even after the Congress extended its last-minute support to her.
Ensuring Ms Kanimozhi's defeat would have been the obvious way for the AIADMK supremo to demonstrate her superiority. But, from the point of view of her admirers, she has still shown that she is in charge by plotting the defeat of the DMDK and indirectly facilitating Ms Kanimozhi's victory. Of course, it's not a triumph that the DMK will like to, not openly at least, credit Ms Jayalalithaa with. Meanwhile, the DMDK led by popular actor Vijayakanth has perhaps itself to blame for the mess. It had severed ties with Ms Jayalalithaa months after the 2011 State Assembly election brought Ms Jayalalithaa and her party to power. Few serious attempts were made thereafter by either partner to repair the alliance. In the given situation, the AIADMK supremo must have thought that Mr Vijayakanth needed to be taught a lesson, even if that led to a victory of the DMK candidate. This is her way of sending across the message that he must come around and re-align with her party. Whether the humiliated former actor will do so any time soon or will he allow the disgrace to wear off before hard political sense beckons him, remains to be seen.
Meanwhile, Ms Jayalalithaa continues to strengthen her position within the State. Notwithstanding her recent, and perhaps one-off, ‘charity' to the DMK, she has welcomed an important Dalit leader and former Minister in the DMK regime to her party fold. This development must not be seen as a mere desertion by a political leader but as a manifestation of growing frustration among the middle and lower rungs of the M Karunanidhi-led party on their marginalisation over the years, and particularly so after the DMK was ousted a couple of years ago. The party cadre and many grassroots leaders of the DMK also believe that their opinions and aspirations are rarely taken into consideration by the party's top brass when it comes to striking or breaking alliances with other parties. For instance, they are hard-pressed to explain how they must handle the Congress — with whom they had parted ways only months ago on a host of issues of ‘principle', all of which are relevant to date — now that the party has extended support to Ms Kanimozhi for another term in the Rajya Sabha. Well, nothing is permanent in politics, and this is more true of politics in Tamil Nadu.