Amma the ambiguous

The Congress might have rejected the feelers sent by AIADMK chief Jayalalithaa to snap ties with the DMK...

The Congress might have rejected the feelers sent by AIADMK chief Jayalalithaa to snap ties with the DMK,but throughout the history of the Dravidian party,launched by M G Ramachandran as a breakaway faction of the DMK,the Congress has had a role to play.

Under K Kamaraj,the Congress was firmly in control till the 1960s. However,the DMKs C N Annadurai,using the anti-Hindi agitation,cornered power in 1967,replacing the Congress. Since then,the Congress has not regained power in the state.

After MGR formed the All India Anna Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam in 1972,he raised a series of charges of corruption against the then CM and DMK leader M Karunanidhi and demanded the dismissal of his government. Indira Gandhi,the then PM,acceded to the request in 1976. In the ensuing Assembly polls,the AIADMK came to power and became close to the Congress in Delhi. In 1979,the AIADMK joined Charan Singh government at the Centre,and soon the relation between the party and Congress soured. The Lok Sabha polls of 1980 saw erstwhile enemies DMK and Congress joining hands against the AIADMK. The alliance won the elections. This was followed by the dismissal of MGR government in 1980. However,the sympathy over the dismissal saw MGR emerge victorious in the resultant Assembly elections. Soon,the Congress and AIADMK were back together again.

While the DMK,AIADMK and Congress fought the election independently in 1989 DMK won the elections,the latter two were together against the DMK soon after Rajiv Gandhis assassination and the DMK was wiped out from the Assembly. The combine swept the Lok Sabha polls too. Soon,Jayalalithaa managed to shift her partys stance on the Lankan issue to an anti-LTTE position a reversal of its pro-Tiger stand during the MGR era.

In 1996,after five years of Jayalalithaas rule,marred with allegations of abuse of power,the Congress decided to continue the alliance despite stiff opposition from the state unit. The decision to go ahead with the alliance split the state unit of the Congress when G K Moopanar and P Chidambaram floated the Tamil Manila Congress. The TMC-DMK combine,fighting the elections against Congress-AIADMK alliance,blanked the latter.

In 1998,armed with 18 crucial members in the Lower House,Jayalalithaa surprised everyone by announcing her decision to support the BJP at the Centre. After repeated threats of pulling out,she finally pulled the rug from under Vajpayees Government,siding with the Congress to defeat the BJP-led government in a trust vote. The DMK sided with the BJP and won the polls.

Jaya returned to power in 2001,after winning the elections along with the Congress,CPI and CPIM. At this juncture,there were strong suggestions of a possible coalition comprising the three prominent women in Indian politics Sonia Gandhi,Jayalalithaa and Mayawati but the bonhomie soon disappeared. In a series of attacks,Jaya took on Sonia,raising the foreign origin issue. By 2004,she had taken the party on a soft Hindutva path,alienating both the Congress and the Left. By then the DMK had come out of the NDA and joined the other secular parties in taking on the BJP nationally and AIADMK regionally.

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Jaya then aligned with the BJP on various issues,including the Sethu Samudram project,and BJP leader Narendra Modi called on her twice in the recent past. Indications were strong that they would face the elections as a single front.

In this context,it was a shocker when she joined hands with the Left for an electoral alliance to take on the Congress and BJP alike,a few months ago.

Though not big enough to garner power on its own,the Congress in Tamil Nadu has enough vote-share with it to act as a spoiler. Hence,there is a growing call among partymen to explore other coalitions that can achieve the dream of coming back to power. Jayalalithaa,on the other hand,is not averse to forging partnerships that can take her party to power.