The Hindu Business Line : Sri Lanka issue sets off political one-upmanship in Tamil Nadu

Chennai: In the absence of any clear wave in the Lok Sabha poll slated for May 13 in Tamil Nadu, it has become a no-holds-barred battle for the two major rival camps. As a corollary to this clueless campaign, the game of one-upmanship on the Sri Lanka Tamils’ issue has reached its peak with political parties, particularly the ruling Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (DMK) and the main Opposition All India Anna Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (AIADMK), vying with one another to prove that they do not lag in espousing the cause of the Eelam Tamils. In this, the DMK president and Chief Minister, Mr M. Karunanidhi, and the AIADMK supremo, Ms Jayalalithaa, have been shifting their stand on the Lankan ethnic problem swiftly to ensure that Tamil sentiments do not affect their poll prospects.

This Lok Sabha poll is crucial for them, as they want to play a role in the government formation at the Centre, besides redefining their strategy in the State where the DMK government’s future hinges on Congress support. Actor-politician and leader of the Desiya Murpokku Dravida Kazhagam, Mr Vijaykant, harps on his pet theme of poll boycott by all parties in support of the Lankan Tamils.

Surprise fast

If Mr Karunanidhi sprang a surprise on his partymen and the public by going on an “indefinite fast” on April 27 calling for a ceasefire in Sri Lanka, Ms Jayalalithaa stunned many observers by declaring on April 29 that if a government of her choice was formed at the Centre, she would take steps to send the Indian Army to the island to carve out Eelam on the lines of the creation of Bangladesh during the Indira Gandhi era.

Though Mr Karunanidhi gave anxious moments to the DMK’s electoral ally, the Congress, by observing the fast, he called it off after six-and-a-half hours on the heels of the Lankan government’s decision to end the combat operations in the war zone.

Making it clear that the DMK had to accomplish the “twin task” of protecting the Sri Lankan Tamils and winning the Lok Sabha polls, Mr Karunanidhi appealed through telegrams to the Prime Minister, Dr Manmohan Singh, and the UPA chairperson, Ms Sonia Gandhi, on April 21 to take immediate steps to bring about a ceasefire in Lanka. The same day, he gave a call for a dawn-to-dusk general strike on April 23 to highlight the demand. The AIADMK and its allies rejected strike call dubbing it a “political stunt”.

Many eyebrows were raised when a private television channel quoted the DMK chief describing the LTTE supremo, V. Prabhakaran, as his friend and not a terrorist. However, subsequently Mr Karunanidhi retracted it, claiming that he was quoted out of context. Even as the Congress dissociated itself from the DMK stand, the flip-flop provided a handle to Ms Jayalalithaa to pose several inconvenient questions to both the parties. Just as the campaign was hotting up, Ms Jayalalithaa chose to radicalise her stand by firing her first salvo in favour of Eelam as the only solution to the ethnic problem. During her electioneering in Erode on April 25, she said if the AIADMK front “is voted to power, it will work for the formation of a Tamil Eelam and will not rest until then.”

Ms Jayalalithaa had also claimed that she was convinced of the need for a separate Eelam after listening to Art of Living Guru, Sri Sri Ravi Shankar, and watching the videos provided by him. The issue assumed a new twist within 24 hours with Sri Sri Ravi Shankar himself clarifying on April 26 that the facilities at the welfare centres meant for the internally displaced people in Sri Lanka’s north were much better than those the Indian government had provided for the Kashmiri Pundits and the island Tamils in Tamil Nadu.

Though the AIADMK’s manifesto favoured a separate state of Eelam only if moves to accord the island Tamils equal status with the Sinhala majority with devolution of administrative power in the Tamil-dominated provinces in the island failed, Ms Jayalalithaa had shifted her stand partly to respond to Mr Karunanidhi’s sudden fast and partly to assuage the feelings of the pro-Eelam allies such as the Pattali Makkal Katchi (PMK) and the Marumalarchi Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (MDMK), according to observers.

Emboldened by Ms Jayalalithaa’s remarks, the PMK and the MDMK leaders, who had been keeping a low profile on the Eelam issue after forging ties with the AIADMK, came out openly in support of the LTTE.

Welcoming her support for the cause of Eelam, the PMK founder, Dr S. Ramadoss, pointed out that the PMK, the MDMK and the Communist Party of India in the AIADMK alliance had taken a common stand on the issue. He even went to the extent of comparing the LTTE supremo to the Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat, and the African National Congress leader, Mr Nelson Mandela.

Resorting to competitive electioneering with only seven days to go for the conclusion of the campaign, both the DMK and the AIADMK are stoically silent on such issues as the “strong warning” issued by a group of film personalities to Dr Manmohan Singh and Ms Sonia Gandhi against campaigning in Tamil Nadu; the MDMK general secretary, Mr Vaiko threatening that the national integration would collapse if the Centre did not take steps to ensure a ceasefire in the island; or the attack by some chauvinist groups on Army personnel in Coimbatore. These are dangerous portents, observers point out.

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