Jingle all the way for Jaya

The AIADMK leader sings it to the crowds in the hill station of the Nilgiris and nearby Coimbatore where her allies, the BJP, is contesting. Jingles pepper the AIADMK leader’s campaign in her desperate comeback bid. And even before the dust kicked up by the speeding caravan settles down, the party cadres pick up the tune.

They are thrilled by Jayalalitha’s new weapon. Through the lilts, Jayalalitha tries to tell the voters about the lapses in the DMK administration. “Prices have sky-rocketed and it is difficult to get essential commodities from the fair-price shops,” she thunders, following it up with the jingle.

Whistles andcheers follow. The party cadres who congregate in salubrious Nilgiris ask for more. Amma obliges: “Sarkarai kettaal, yettil ezhuthi vaithu kol enru solranga, Mannennai kettaal, bhoomiyai thondi vettikko enru solranga (Ask for sugar and they ask you to write on paper, Ask for kerosene and they ask you to dig the ground)”.

And, of course, there are the more familiar ones. “Fort St. George for uncle (Karunanidhi), Red Fort for nephew (Murasoli Maran) and Chennai for son (M.K. Stalin), no votes for them.”

But Jayalalitha and her party are yet to reconcile themselves with another ally, the MDMK. In Kotagiri, a section of the crowd cheers their leader Vaiko (MDMK general secretary V. Gopalsamy) even as Jayalalitha is winding up her speech. She tries to tell them: “It is not Vaiko who is here. I am here.” The Vaiko fans don’t stop, they continue hailing their leader. A furious Jayalalitha screams: “If you want to shout Vaiko’ then go and listen to his speech. Do not come to my meeting.”

The sizeablepopulation of Sri Lankan expatriates in the hill station, who owe allegiance to the MDMK leader, largely contribute to the impressive crowd there. However, party sources describes them as “mischief- makers” and “vested interests” who wished to disrupt the meeting.

The AIADMK road show continues and draws crowds in Mettupalayam, Coonoor, Kotagiri and ends finally at the V.O.C. grounds in Coimbatore.

She does not stop blaming Karunanidhi for anything, anywhere she goes. While in Ooty, Jayalalitha flays the State administration on the touchy issue of the polluted’ lake there, which she says was cleaned at a cost of Rs 2 crore when she was Chief Minister. “When there was a landslide at Barliar in Ooty, I visited the injured in the hospital and provided relief to the victims and on a war-footing got the Bailey bridge put up to restore traffic. What did Karunanidhi do when such a calamity struck during his period? Nothing,” she says.

In Coimbatore, she blasts the government for its inefficient’handling of the riots. It is time to wrap up so, it’s a jingle again.