EVERY political discussion in Chennai veers around the question: which is the real PMO? Is it 7 Race Course Road or 36 Poes Garden? Even senior AIADMK leaders privately concede that their Madam has trespassed the "Lakshmana Rekha" that clearly offers and protects the exclusive prerogative of a prime minister. They point to three incidents where Jayalalitha acted as if she were prime minister.
First, when she asked Sedapatti Muthiah to quit the cabinet. That evening she not only announced that Muthiah's portfolio would be looked after by another AIADMK member of the Union cabinet—Thambi Durai—but also declared that during the next cabinet reshuffle, Dindugul Srinivasan would be appointed as the new surface transport minister. The Indian Constitution clearly states that it is an exclusive right of the prime minister to appoint his council of ministers as well as to decide their portfolios. Never before in the history of Independent India, has anyone other than the PM publicly stated the names of ministers as well as their portfolios.
Second, when the BJP-led government decided to change the entire team of standing counsels for the central government, the AIADMK supremo not only decided the team but also asked Union law minister Thambi Durai to give their appointment letters to her. She summoned the 33 lawyers to Poes Garden and handed over their appointment letters after a stern briefing about how they should function in court.
Third, when she pulled up Union home minister L.K. Advani for a statement made by special secretary Ashok Kumar, which virtually gave a clean chit to the DMK government. Says an AIADMK leader: "Even Vajpayee would not have dared to pull up Advani. Only Madam has the courage to point out the mistakes." AIADMK leaders feel that while Nagpur wants to control the government, it is only Poes Garden, which has actually managed to do it.
Apart from the Union ministers belonging to the AIADMK, two other cabinet ministers brief Poes Garden before taking any major decisions. Petroleum minister Vazhapadi K. Ramamurthy and power minister Rangarajan Kumaramangalam have made it very clear that their primary loyalty is to Jayalalitha, not Vajpayee. So it's back to the query: who's PM?
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