Family feud intensified in the DMK as the leadership on Friday suspended MK Alagiri, former Union Minister for Chemicals and Fertilisers and the elder son of M Karunanidhi from the primary membership of the party.
Alagiri, in an interview on a Tamil news channel, had come down heavily on the DMK leadership for its efforts to rope in the DMDK led by Vijayakanth to its fold. He ridiculed Vijayakanth, which made Karunanidhi to issue a statement openly cautioning his elder son. The party leadership was unhappy with his utterances.
Alagiri, addressed as Anja Nenjan (brave heart) by his loyalists, has been suspended for indiscipline, anti-party activities and to maintain decorum in the party, according to K Anbazhagan (92), the DMK general secretary.
With the suspension of Alagiri, who has been holding the post of the south zone organising secretary of the party, the intra-family dispute in the Karunanidhi clan may have reached a point of no return. Thursday saw the party leadership striking at the roots of Alagiri in Madurai by suspending five of his most loyal workers.
The suspension of Alagiri was announced hardly one hour after he called on his nonagenarian father Karunanidhi at the latter’s Gopalapuram residence. Onlookers said a furious Alagiri gatecrashed Gopalapuram and was heard shouting at his father for suspending his loyalists. TKS Elangovan, party spokesman, told the newspersons waiting outside Gopalapuram that the suspension was to maintain decency and decorum in the party. “We will ask for an explanation from Alagiri for violating party directives,” said Elangovan.
Alagiri upped his ante by evening openly challenging his farther M Karunanidhi and younger brother MK Stalin. “My suspension is not going to help the DMK. I asked the party president about the reasons behind the suspension of five party workers. Is asking the reason for the suspension of party workers an offenceIJ This means that party workers are not safe in the DMK,” Alagiri told a Tamil news channel in a telephonic interview.
He blamed the vested interest of certain leaders in the party for his suspension. “I stand for transparency in the handling of party properties and resources. If they do not like this stance, I am helpless. But I am not going to sit idle,” warned Alagiri.
But Karunanidhi and Alagiri’s younger brother Stalin chose to underplay the significance of the latest development. Both made it clear that the suspension would not have any effect on the morale of the party workers. Karunanidhi said the suspension of Alagiri would not have any bearing on the DMK. He gave enough hints that the suspension is a temporary arrangement and the bridge has not yet been burnt fully. “We will not appoint another south zone organising secretary as this post has been created exclusively for Alagiri,” Karunanidhi told the newspersons.
The Madurai strongman was on a visit to Malaysia with his wife and returned late Thursday night to Chennai. Friday morning saw his acolytes alerting him about the suspension order served on them at the instance of Stalin. The brothers are having a running battle for the control of the DMK as Karunanidhi (91) is in the autumn of his life. Though Karunanidhi had made it known that Stalin would be his successor, Alagiri retorted by asserting that he would not accept anybody other than Karunanidhi as the party chief.
Thursday’s suspension of the five Madurai satraps of the party was for violation of Stalin’s diktat to them not to celebrate Alagiri’s 63rd birthday (which falls on January 30) in grand style. They went ahead with the plans to celebrate the birthday in style as part of the festivities; they put up posters, banners and wall writings all over Madurai.
A Muthuvel, one of the top Alagiri loyalists, was reportedly abused by P Moorthy (the new Madurai secretary and close aide of Stalin) for violating party directives and putting up posters of Alagiri. Muthuvel filed a police complaint against Moorthy under the Scheduled Caste/Scheduled Tribe (Prevention of Atrocities) Act for abusing him in derogative words and calling him caste names. S Kannan, another Alagiri loyalist, also filed a similar case against P Kulainthavelu and M Jeyaraman, the two Stalin retainers. The party high command retaliated by suspending the five Alagiri loyalists on Thursday.
A veteran DMK watcher said the suspension of Alagiri could be to facilitate the coronation of Stalin as the next party chief. Karunanidhi knows well that if Stalin is not anointed during his life time, the younger son may end up as a non-entity in the party once the patriarch walks into the sunset.