Rebuff flusters TN Congmen

The view of the Congressmen was that political decency demanded that she should have arrived in Villupuram at least an hour before Sonia Gandhi arrived and ensured proper arrangements at the meeting venue. The excuse that Jayalalitha was held up on the way is not bought by any one except Jayalalitha8217;s new acolyte PCC president T K Ramamurthy.

Either Jayalalitha should have left three hours earlier or called up Sonia Gandhi hours earlier to express her difficulty.8217; Having kept Sonia Gandhi waiting, Jayalalitha showed disrespect to an ally, that too the leader of a national party and the widow of Rajiv Gandhi, is the view of Congresmen in the Villupuram district, was the common refrain here.

In fact Jayalalitha showed no keenness to join Sonia Gandhi in the campaign. She could have addressed the Tiruchy meeting earlier in the day with Sonia Gandhi and travelled with her by helicopter to Villupuram, if she wanted, was another opinion expressed.

TNCC president T K Ramamurthy,however, said in Chennai that what happened at Villupuram yesterday resulted from the failure of the two parties to synchronise the programmes of the two leaders. While Sonia Gandhi came from Tiruchy by helicopter, Jayalalitha proceeded from Chennai by road. Contrary to reports, we were informed by the AIADMK about how Jayalalitha got held up on the way and that she would not able to make it before 6.00 p.m.8217;

He denied there was any rift between the two allies. Jayalalitha confirmed her participation in the programme when he met her at Perambalur on August 20.

Jayalalitha agreed for an hour and half programme but said let Sonia Gandhi introduce the Congress candidates alone.8217; The AIADMK candidates needed no introduction as they were presented during her first phase of the tour since August 1.

As Sonia Gandhi had to leave for Delhi yesterday evening and go to Hyderabad today morning, we had no alternative but to go ahead with the programme without Jayalalitha.8217;

Jayalalitha8217;s absence was incidental,and there was no possibility of the Congress-AIADMK alliance getting derailed, Ramamurthy asserted.

Disagreeing with Ramamurthy8217;s contention, sources pointed out that the electoral understanding between the two parties came about after much wrangling on both sides. The emissaries of Sonia Gandhi 8211; CWC members Manmohan Singh and A K Antony 8211; who negotiated with Jayalalitha on seat-sharing almost failed to make it during the second round of talks.

After the tortuous negotiating process in three rounds, the 12 seats allotted to the Congress were the seats from which the AIADMK did not prefer to contest for various reasons, the Congress candidates felt.

The Congress had the candidates list ready and identified the seats from where they had winning chances. But the AIADMK list did not agree with that formulation. It started with the number of seats that could be shared and then identified the constituencies.

The result was chaos in many constituencies. For instance, former TNCC president K V Thangabalu andtreasurer V Dhandayuthapani are outsiders8217; to their constituencies 8211; Arakonam and South Chennai 8211; in electoral terms.

Moreover, the failure of the AICC to decide on their candidates early appeared to have irked Jayalalitha who was the first off the bloc in the race for campaigning. In many constituencies, she had to introduce unofficial8217; Congress candidates.

The inability of the TNCC leadership to coordinate with the AIADMK in the poll campaign and basic organisational weakness of the TNCC were some of the factors that led Jayalalitha, who has finished the first phase of her campaign across the State, to conclude that the Congress would be a liability for the AIADMK in the Lok Sabha poll, sources said. She has begun to feel that 12 seats for the Congress8217; was a bad bargain.