What do the numbers mean?
The ballot boxes are sealed and so are the fates of the 2,748 candidates who were had appealed to the nearly 4.6 crore voters in Tamil Nadu in a campaign that was barely 15 days long. Candidates are trying to decipher what it meant when as many as 77.8 percent – which is unprecedented in TN – came out to vote on April 13. Conventional wisdom says that when record numbers come out to vote, it means the opposition (in this case Jayalalitha) is at an advantage. So round one for Amma. But, here’s a fact that should stop here from counting her chickens before they are hatched. In 2009 Lok Sabha too there was a huge voter turnout (72 per cent) and many would remember that in her dreams she had already seen the back of the DMK. But they were dreams only because she was trumped when the ballot boxes were opened. In that election, the DMK got 18 seats to her party’s tally of 9. She retired to Kodanadu disappointed and depressed.
The “swing factor” that came into play in the penultimate days before the poll went against her. One of the so-called “swing factors” was money. So in this election too, the unprecedented turnout cannot be written off. Particularly because of the many reports of money power, unleashed largely by the DMK, it is not easy to tell whether people came and voted for amma because they want to give her a chance or the DMK because their pockets were bulging with cash for votes. Not that the AIADMK did not also give out money, but being out of power here for the last five years and 12 years at the centre, the AIADMK’s financial clout has diminished considerably.
The tradition in TN has been that the DMK and AIADMK have taken turns to form the government after the DMK handed the Congress a debacle in 1967. By the way, at 76.57 per cent, that year, was significant because the Dravidian parties took over the political canvas in this state, reducing the Congress to a minor partner of either the DMK or AIADMK since 1967.
Incidentally, what was the EC doing when the CM’s son Azhagiri fashioned the “thirumangalam formula” in January 2009, which was the blueprint followed in the subsequent bypolls? The sway of currency notes can be seen from a report that voters in Pennagaram (which was the last bypoll held in February last year) were waiting for money to vote because they have got used to it in the bypoll. Here the DMK won by wresting the seat from the PMK (what an irony that they are part of the same alliance this time) and the AIADMK candidate lost his deposit. When her candidate was humiliated and when she lost all the earlier bypolls, it’s a mystery that Jayalalitha did not bring the roof down over money power. Now she not only has to battle the DMK but also people spoilt by riches. Recently when I was in Thanjavur, women who were planting paddy saplings demanded to be paid before they even talked to me.
There’s another explanation too for the huge turnout. That people were so happy with the DMK’s welfare schemes and freebies, not to mention their anticipation at what’s in store because of all the goodies promises in the DMK manifesto, they gave an unequivocal thumbs up. At least that’s what the DMK would like to believe.
It’s not easy to predict
But both parties should mull on the following: In 1984, 73 per cent voted (soon after Mrs Indira Gandhi was assassinated and CM M G Ramachandran was hospitalized) and the incumbent AIADMK came back; in 1989, 70 per cent voted and the DMK ousted the AIADMK; in 1991, 64 per cent voted (former PM Rajiv Gandhi was assassinated mid-election) and the AIADMK (which was in alliance with the Congress) routed the DMK; in 1996, 67 per cent came to vote and out went the AIADMK and in came the DMK; in 2001, 59 per cent voted and the AIADMK came back; in 2006, 71 per cent voted bringing in the DMK.
However, it should be mentioned that in 2006, the DMK did not get a majority (they got 96 seats, the half way mark is 117 in the TN legislative assembly which has 234 seats) and could only form the government because of the Congress (35 seats) support. Jayalalitha and her allies got 69 seats (AIADMK got 57 seats). So does nearly 80 per cent turnout mean advantage Amma considering that Vijayakanth who went alone in 2006 is with her now? Well, she will have to wait with bated breath till May 13.
But one thing is clear, if Amma loses, her scapegoat will be money power of the DMK and if the DMK loses, it will blame the the “undeclared emergency” imposed by the Election Commission.
The Purathchi Thalaivi’s world view
The story goes that DMDK chief Vijayakant went out of his way to avoid AIADMK’s Jayalalitha during the campaign. Nearly 15 leaders including A B Bardhan, Prakash Karat and even Chandrababu Naidu (what was he doing there except to score brownie points because Congress leader and “megastar” Chiranjeevi was drafted to campaign? Incidentally Chiru fled TN after he found his crowd-pulling abilities had deserted him) turned up but DMDK presidium chairman Panrutti Ramachandran was a stand-in for the actor. Panruti said lamely that Vijayakanth could not be there because he was campaigning elsewhere.
‘Captain’ Vijayakanth did not want to be put in a position where he had to hail Jayalalitha as the “puratchi thalaivi”. And Jayalalitha, despite the signal she tried to send out about lack of cohesiveness in her front, is not the kind who takes kindly to anyone stealing her thunder. And the crowd does go into a tizzy when they see their “captain”. So she was happy too. Besides, the alliance is opportunistic (and they are both hoping win-win) because DMDK won’t play spoiler this time by taking away AIADMK votes. But many have doubts whether these two leaders will go the distance after the results come out on May 13.
What is significant is that Jayalalitha, who had targeted Congress President Sonia Gandhi’s foreign origins some years ago, did not mention her or Rahul Gandhi during her entire campaign. Her vitriol was reserved for CM Karunanidhi and his family. In fact, she only targeted the Congress towards the end of her campaign attacking Prime Minister Manmohan Singh as being “weak” (“The PM is out of touch with the problems of common people and deserves to be thrown out”) and criticizing finance minister Pranab Kumar Mukherjee for saying freebies were okay despite TN’s debt burden being Rs 1,00,000 crores. Her explanation is that all the freebies she has in mind will be underwritten by growth in agriculture and industry.
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It is also significant that neither Sonia nor Rahul mentioned Jayalalitha by name. Some months ago when DMK MPs threatened to resign on the 2G issue, Jayalalitha was ready to walk into UPA-2 with her 9 MPs (plus MPs representing other parties in an alliance she claimed she had sewn up) and said so publicly but was rebuffed by the Congress. Although she is not the one to forget a slight, amma is becoming politically savvy enough to realize that personal feelings and politics don’t mix. Recently, Karunanidhi was pointedly asked about Sonia Gandhi and Rahul Gandhi not attacking the AIADMK, and he could only say, “It shows their culture.” But he must have forgotten Sonia’s attacks on former PM Vajpayee ("unka mansik santulan bigad gaya hai" (he has lost his marbles), BJP leaders L K Advani and Narender Modi. There was no culture there, only politics!
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Babe in the woods
Though it was in bad taste what union minister V Narayanswamy said in Puducherry last week, popular perception is that it is true considering the goodies both the DMK (is showering and will give) and the AIADMK will shower on people if voted to power. As an aside, most people believe that Karunanidhi will make good on his promise, but as far as Jayalalitha goes there is a trust deficit because they say she offers bait but never follows through. Coming back to Narayanswamy, he put his foot in the mouth when he told women during a campaign, “These days you are using cellphones to quarrel with your husband. If Congress comes to power, we will provide one more, so you can quarrel more…This government has provided you with everything, except babies.” The parliamentary affairs minister has tried to slide out of this comment by saying, “It was made in a lighter vein.” But BJP leader Sushma Swaraj did not let the minister off lightly, “This was not a comment made in lighter vein at all but is a character assassination of womanhood.”
That the minister has made such a comment soon after census figures for 2011 showed declining child sex ratios (CSR), particularly in TN, is condemnable, says an activist. The CSR in the districts of Ariyalur, Cuddalore, Perambalur, and Villupuram has dropped drastically. Ariyulur is at the bottom of the list with 892 girls to 1,000 boys, according to the census 2011 data. The good news is that Dharmapuri, Salem, Theni and Namakkal, identified as high-risk districts in 2001, have shown an increase in the child sex ratio.
All play and no work?
The EC has made sure that everyone knows it’s not a toothless tiger and evidence of that is from the repeated complaints by the CM and his union minister M K Azhagiri. But as they say a basket of apples is bound to have some rotten fruit. Similarly, all poll observers who, according to Chief Electrical Officer Praveen Kumar, were supposed to stick to their constituencies treated their Tamil Nadu stint to take in the tourist sites. Some went to famous temples including Tirupati, which is about four hours away by road. Praveen Kumar confirmed “We have received a complaint about an observer visiting a temple in southern TN (a reference possibly to the Meenakshi tample in Madurai) and have forwarded it to the EC.”
But there are others whose intentions are not so “holy” and that included kicking back in a beach resort on East Coast Road. Chennai Port Trust chairman Atulya Mishra told the local media that though the port had not invited the poll observers, “when they approached us and requested us, we arranged a trip.” Eight observers posted in Chennai reportedly went to the port and asked for a boat. “Since they came from a place where there was no sea, they wanted to go for a boat ride”, said a port official adding that two high-speed patrol boats were allocated to them. Incidentally when the observers first arrived at the port in two cars, rumours went around that they were there to seize cash from containers, but soon enough it became clear that leisure not seizure was on their minds!
