Karunanidhi's 94th Birthday Bash Could Be The Venue For Stalin's Coronation

Traditionally, every birthday of Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (DMK) chief M. Karunanidhi, which falls on June 3, is associated with great publicity and propaganda. However, his 94th birthday celebration on Saturday, not orchestrated by the Kalaignar for the first time in his 50 years as legislator, will be on a different tangent. All eyes will be on the party’s working president and Karunanidhi’s son M.K. Stalin, and if events go as scripted he could be the lodestar that guides Tamil Nadu out of its current political turmoil and inspire the people, especially the youth in the state.

The public meeting in Chennai is expected to be graced by a galaxy of national leaders. It could appear as a move by the DMK to cement an anti-BJP alliance ahead of the presidential elections or Lok Sabha polls in 2019, but the underlying agenda is to proclaim Stalin king. With the hero of day remaining out of the klieg lights and the jostling crowds since his presence there could jeopardise his failing health, the host of the political carnival, Stalin, will steal the thunder.

But Stalin, who has been showing an inclination to chart a new course in Tamil Nadu’s political firmament by breaking the stereotypical image of the DMK without discarding the banner, seems to have set his eyes at the next assembly elections, scheduled for 2021 — it might come about earlier, given the infighting in the ruling All India Anna Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (AIADMK).

However, Stalin’s own image took a beating when he clumsily handled the AIADMK’s floor test on a vote of confidence motion in the Assembly on February 28. His discreet entreaties with the BJP, when the AIADMK was split and the groups were at loggerheads, by calling on Union Home Minister Rajnath Singh and making a vain bid to meet the Prime Minister did not bear fruits. That perhaps put him on a confrontationist course with the BJP. This could be the reason behind his efforts to cobble up this anti-saffron rainbow assemblage, perhaps as a birthday gift to the Kalaignar. This year, 2017, also marks the 50^th anniversary of Karunandihi becoming a legislator.

In 1957, when the DMK sent its first set of 15 MLAs, the Communists captured power in neighbouring Kerala, much to the chagrin of the Central government. The Communists were then tooth and nail against the Centre just as the Pinayari Vijayan government is now going for the BJP government’s jugular on the cattle trade ban notification. Jawaharlal Nehru, then prime minister, openly expressed his antipathy towards the DMK and its policies that year at a meeting in Madras when he could not even pronounce the name ‘Dravidar Munnetra Kazhagam’ despite K. Kamaraj’s prompts. Now, 60 years later, Nehru’s great grandson Rahul Gandhi could be greeting Karunanidhi for the very same feat that his illustrious ancestor resented.

Expected to be present at the Saturday celebrations are Rahul Gandhi, Nitish Kumar, Sharad Kumar, Sitaram Yechuri, Derek O’Brien, Farookh Abdullah and V. Narayanasamy. For Stalin, it will be a launch pad to national reckoning and a consolidation of his position as the undisputed DMK helmsman.

But how Stalin steers the DMK through the changed political landscape in Tamil Nadu is not clear. Though, of late, he has been taking firm positions against the governments at the state and Centre on a plethora of issues, one of his challenges would be to win over the younger generation of voters, who had a real taste of politics during the Jallikattu protest on Marina Beach in Chennai and are now raring to change the system.

However, with both the AIADMK factions of O. Panneerselvam and Edappadi Palanisami discrediting themselves by behaving like BJP stooges, the BJP shooting itself in the foot through the Centre’s latest controversial offerings and no other political party gaining prominence to be in the reckoning on its own, the DMK under Stalin could emerge as the forerunner in the next hustings. Yet it all depends on how the slew smaller parties—like Vijayakanth’s DMDK, Vaiko’s MDMK, Thirumavalavan’s VCK, Anbumani Ramadoss’ PMK— go about forging alliances and how Stalin manages to rope at least some of them into his fold.

G Babu Jayakumar is a senior journalist based in Chennai

The views expressed in this article are personal