The Fight For Amma’s Legacy

Last week, leading Tamil publication Vikatan published the findings of a survey among the people of Tamil Nadu. The seventh question in the poll was the choice of politician to lead the state. The findings were telling. Over 44 per cent of the respondents said there is no one good enough among the present crop of netas to lead Tamil Nadu. The maximum support came for O Panneerselvam at 16.75 per cent, followed by MK Stalin at 12.91 per cent. The rest were in single digits, with Jayalalithaa’s niece Deepa at 5.09 per cent and VK Sasikala’s nephew, TTV Dinakaran, at 0.4 per cent.

The triumph of NOTA (none of the above) means Tamil Nadu has rejected Tamil Nadu. That is the story so far as the state heads into the electoral battle that may well define its immediate political future. On April 12, Dr Radhakrishnan Nagar will vote to elect its next member of the Legislative Assembly (MLA). After Jayalalithaa represented this constituency in Chennai twice – first winning the by-election after her acquittal in the Disproportionate Assets case in June 2015 and then retaining the seat in the May 2016 elections – RK Nagar has become synonymous with the Amma legacy.

Both factions of the All India Anna Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (AIADMK) therefore understand that a RK Nagar win is worth its weight in gold. And buoyed by its success in winning the trust vote on February 18, by herding all its MLAs to the Golden Resort, 60 kilometres from Chennai, the Sasikala camp has decided to risk it all. The decision to field TTV Dinakaran is political messaging of the bold kind. It says that despite a 0.4 per cent approval rating, if the survey is anything to go by, Dinakaran is willing to face the EVM bullets.

But politicians as a tribe are not known to play blind, though they may pretend to do so. Dinakaran knows that RK Nagar has been an AIADMK stronghold and that the Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (DMK) has not won this seat since 2001. Jayalalithaa in 2015 won with a margin of 1.5 lakh votes though that by-poll saw all non-Left parties (including the DMK) not putting up a candidate. The following year in a multi-cornered contest, her victory margin was down to 39,000. Dinakaran hopes to make this election about Dinakaran versus the rest, and hope to gain by the anti-Dinakaran split in votes. Which is perhaps why he claims he will win by at least 50,000 votes.

Hope or bravado, Tamil Nadu will know on 15 April when the votes are counted. Especially when the traditional AIADMK vote will be split three ways between Dinakaran, Deepa Jayakumar and OPS camp’s candidate. In a state where sentiment still guides many voters, Deepa’s resemblance to her aunt is the X-factor that will net her some votes. But beyond that, Deepa has nothing much to offer and her political inexperience and lack of an effective election management structure could mean she could end up becoming the Lakshmi Parvathi of Tamil Nadu politics.

Team OPS in comparison, will be a more formidable threat. It is working on ensuring it is recognised as the real AIADMK and gets allotted the two leaves symbol. The Election Commission is expected to reveal its mind on March 20.

Panneerselvam may persuade Madhusudanan, the AIADMK presidium chairman to contest since he has also represented RK Nagar once before in 1991. But the candidates do not really matter. The election is more of an effort to be seen as the real AIADMK, with RK Nagar merely the battlefield. The contest will be fought over whether a man expelled from the party in 2011 and never taken back, can attempt to claim Amma’s legacy.

The electoral battle is bound to be dirty. Dinakaran’s decision to contest himself is seen as an attempt by the Mannargudi family to spread its tentacles into every part of Amma’s empire. After having taken over her residence at Poes Garden, occupied key posts in her party, the next goal is her constituency. Though Dinakaran denies it at present, the status of a legislator, if he wins, will ensure he is just one step away from asking chief minister Edappadi Palaniswami to step aside and become CM himself.

The DMK has surprised many by fielding a low-profile candidate, N Maruthuganesh, a lawyer and part-time journalist from RK Nagar. DMK leaders say the idea was to present a contrast to Team Sasikala. Unlike AIADMK, where one powerful family seems eager to grab all the political goodies, Ganesh is a son of the RK Nagar soil. He hails from a family loyal to the DMK and his mother was a councillor in Chennai twice. The DMK believes its decision to support the local unit of the party and not parachute a candidate from outside will fetch it dividends in a middle-class constituency like RK Nagar. It decided not to field its 2016 candidate Shimla Muthuchozhan for the same reason – she is the daughter-in-law of a former minister and reportedly did not gel with the local cadre.

The party feels if the campaign is managed well, a division in the AIADMK vote would, arithmetically speaking, make it easy for DMK to push the Mannargudi family, Deepa and Panneerselvam off the cliff in one go. Given that just half a dozen disgruntled AIADMK MLAs could then bring the government down, RK Nagar could result in tectonic shift at Fort St George as well.

The fight will be as much on the streets in hot and humid Chennai as it will be in the virtual space over mobile handsets. The OPS camp taunts Dinakaran calling him the only candidate who loses all Twitter polls with a 5:95 per cent margin. But an election is vastly different from a Twitter poll, more so in Tamil Nadu. Because in the ugliest tradition of politics in the state, the constituency is certain to see money power play a significant role. Left to the politicians, RK Nagar will virtually be up for sale.