CHENNAI: Five years ago, when the country was on the verge of electing the next President, it was the AIADMK, with all of 14 members in both Houses of Parliament, which decided the opposition candidate.
When the date for the next presidential election was declared on Wednesday, the party was the third biggest contingent in Parliament with a combined strength of 50 MPs, but had little or no role in deciding the outcome.
This is a stark reversal of fortunes in just a few months after the death of its leader, J Jayalalithaa, the prime mover in 2012 presidential elections.
In the 2012 elections, even before the notification for the presidential election was made, Jayalalithaa took the lead by proposing the name of former Lok Sabha Speaker P A Sangma for the post.
At a time when both ruling Congress and opposition BJP were yet to study all permutations and combinations, Jaya, along with her Odisha counterpart Naveen Patnaik, played the Sangma card went ahead with campaigning for him.
Ahead of the election notification, senior BJP leader Arun Jaitley called on Jayalalithaa, followed by the senior-most leader, LK Advani. Eventually, the BJP had to support Sangma, an eminently qualified tribal leader.
By proposing Sangma even when many names, including that of President Pranab Mukherjee, the then Union finance minister, were doing the rounds, Jayaalithaa set the pace and forced the rest to hasten their plans. She did not make it easy for them.
Immediately after proposing Sangma as her candidate, Jayalalithaa spoke to leaders of various political parties, including Advani, Shiromani Akali Dal chief and Punjab CM Prakash Singh Badal, the then CPI (M) general secretary Prakash Karat and CPI general secretary, the late AB Bardhan, Telugu Desam Party chief N Chandrababu Naidu and Samajwadi Party chief Mulayam Singh Yadav.
Her candidate did not win, but her shrewd moves positioned her a leader to be reckoned with at the national level, setting the ground for a potential stake claim in 2014 general elections.
Now, after factionalism in the AIADMK, the groups headed by Chief Minister ‘Edappadi’ K Palaniswami and former chief minister O Panneerselvam have unofficially decided to support the BJP candidate in the presidential elections, while it is not clear what position the 33 MLAs owing allegiance to Dhinakaran would take.
The AIADMK has 135 MLAs while DMK has 89 followed by Congress, which has eight. DMK’s ally IUML has one MLA.