By-election bouts are generally a no-brainer as the rule of thumb says they tend to tilt in favour of the party in power. In Tamil Nadu and Puducherry, four such contests for Assembly seats will happen on November 19. Puducherry Chief Minister V Narayanasamy is in the fray from the safe Nellithope constituency that was vacated by sitting Congress member John Kumar to ensure his smooth passage into the Assembly. Since Narayanasamy has already sewn up an alliance with the DMK, the contest is of academic interest.
In Tamil Nadu, two of the three seats — Aravakurichi in Karur district and Thanjavur — are actually those where elections were put off in May last after the massive seizure of money that was allegedly meant to bribe voters. Though technically the two seats don’t fall under the bypoll bracket, they could be treated as one since the May 16 Assembly elections that gave a decisive mandate to the AIADMK could influence voting as people by and large tend be on the right side of the ruling party.
If the Election Commission indeed wanted to showcase Aravakurichi and Thanjavur as examples of its will power to cleanse the system, there is little evidence to suggest it is on the job. For, both the Dravidian majors thumbed their nose at the poll watchdog and repeated the same candidates whose alleged use of money power was responsible for the postponement of polls. It reminds you of this story of a snake on a biting spree that went passive after it was persuaded to behave by a saint. On his next visit, the saint found the reptile badly bruised because of stoning by street urchins. The saint drilled some common sense into the snake, saying “Agreed, I asked you not to bite, but when did I stop you from hissing?” The Election Commission may have hissed once by putting off the polls in Aravakurichi and Thanjavur, but without follow-up hissing that has not happened yet, it may only serve as target practice for the urchins.
That brings us to the jugaad factor that crafty politicians employ when the going gets tough. Since there is no substitute for victory, the really jugaad ones find workarounds to get under the radar and sweeten the deal with voters in the last few days before polling under the cover of darkness. The Election Commission would definitely raise the bar in terms of vehicle checks to look for large unaccounted cash in all the four constituencies, but what is the guarantee that money has not reached the distribution points already? Does it have a mechanism to ferret it out? Since the proof is in the pudding, the polling day will be the judgement day as well.
In Tiruparankundram, the DMK shot itself in the foot by fielding its medical wing secretary Dr P Saravanan as it bypoll nominee there, as he is already facing a chargesheet for implanting expired stents on cardiac patients in his Saravana Multispecialty Hospital. The Madras High Court has already rejected two anticipatory bail petitions filed by him. That the medical practitioner is a man with deep pockets was outed by dissident leader M K Alagiri’s son Dhaya Alagiri. “So sad to know that Madurai DMK doesn’t have any better candidate than Saravanan to contest the by-elections,” Dhaya tweeted and tagged it ‘#KaasuPanamDhoduMoneyMoney’, a popular song from a hit Tamil film that talks about the manipulations possible with money power.
It is well known that political parties give a lot of weightage to ticket aspirants who are moneybags. They are asked upfront about their ability to spend during interviews that happen before parties cherry pick their candidates. When the choice of a candidate itself is tied to his ability to mobilise funds, money power is a given in any elections. So what type of electoral cleansing are we talking about? Piecemeal solutions definitely won’t work.
The only variable during the current round of by-elections is the health status of Chief Minister J Jayalalithaa. The ailing chief minister has been the subject of vicious speculation for over a month with the Opposition looking for opportunities to crack open the party amid hyperactivity from Raj Bhavan. Latest reports quoting Apollo Hospitals chairman Dr Prathap C Reddy as saying she is “interacting and responding remarkably to treatment” and Governor C H Vidyasagar Rao meeting her would give the AIADMK added confidence and serve it well.
After finding that the health card was no longer working, the Leader of the Opposition and DMK heir apparent tried to shift focus by calling an all-party meeting on the Cauvery water row. He was promptly told off by the People’s Welfare Alliance convenor Vaiko and BJP’s Tamilisai Soundararajan, who questioned his locus standi to do so. The battle for voter attention is building up, but the electorate may have already made their choice.
Suresh Sundaram
Assistant Resident Editor, Tamil Nadu
Email: ssuresh@newindianexpress.com