A G Perarivalan alias Arivu is now a free man following a legal battle, and that long fight provides scope for throwback moments of Tamil sentiment that propelled the struggle which was backed by most political parties and successive governments in Tamil Nadu.
Observers say the one on one meeting between Jaya and Vaiko, lasting 15 minutes, is significant from the forecast of early Lok Sabha polls, as her party the All India Anna DMK is ready to offer two Lok Sabha seats to the MDMK
The Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam, till yesterday the government's major ally, joined hands with arch-rival the All India Anna DMK and other Tamil Nadu political parties on Wednesday to reject the request of Finance Minister P Chidambaram for a structured debate on Union Budget 2013 in the Rajya Sabha on Thursday, and the passage of the Budget.
Four and a half crore voters will decide the fate of 2,773 candidates.
Though the DMK clinched the deal with the Congress after a logjam over seat allocation and identification, cadres of both parties are yet to forget the mental agony they underwent all these days, according to political analysts in Chennai. The high commands of the two parties will find it a tough task to prevail on them to go for election campaign straightaway, they said
Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam President M K Stalin will try his luck once again from Kolathur constituency in Chennai in the April 6 Tamil Nadu assembly elections while his son Udhayanidhi will make his electoral debut by contesting from the Chepauk-Triplicane segment in the metropolis.
The ruling All India Anna DMK bagged 37 out of the 39 seats in the state, with the Bharatiya Janata Party winning one seat and its alliance partner the Pattali Makkal Katchi winning one.
'Even though we are very religious and God fearing, we do not subscribe to the kind of Hindutva they practise, a very hierarchical, Brahmanical, Hindutva.'
It may be recalled that at the time of the last Presidential elections in 2002, Naidu had worked for evolving a consensus on the candidature of Dr A P J Abdul Kalam while the Left parties had fielded Mrs Lakshmi Sahgal.
The Supreme Court today stayed a ruling Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam-sponsored bandh in Tamil Nadu on the Setusamudram project issue slated for tomorrow. A bench headed by Justice B N Aggarwal stayed the bandh called tomorrow or on any other day
'Those in the BJP are more keen to make India Hindia!' says MDMK Chairman L.Ganesan.
It is the third party in Tamil Nadu, after DMK and MDMK, to quit the BJP-led alliance.
The party had on Monday decided to pull out of the NDA.
'They are all the time asking people not to do this, not to do that.' 'Their version of society and Hinduism is very warped; not an inclusive one.'
With the Tamil Nadu electorate having given him an unprecedented mandate that had eluded his father the late M Karunanidhi, Stalin has to prove his worth, ensuring at the same time that the Dravidian drag on the AIADMK's side does not open up space for the BJP to make inroads in the state, says N Sathiya Moorthy.
The DMK feels its genuine gestures have had no bearing on the governor's politico-administrative conduct, which is 'more political and politicised than administrative and Constitutional', observes N Sathiya Moorthy.
The notion that the BJP gained its increased tally by wiping out the Left parties and the Congress is completely misleading. Equally misleading is the belief that the TMC held its ground in all its existing seats. A little more than a fifth of the seats Mamata Banerjee's party had won in 2016 was lost to the BJP this time.
'"Pakistan will come and bite you" doesn't work here.'
Justice G Jayachandran disposed of the petitions filed by Bharathi and another one by the non-governmental organisation 'Arappor Iyakkam' represented by Jairam Venkatesh seeking a direction to the DVAC to probe the complaint. "...The inquiry has to be completed as expeditiously as possible...," the judge said.
The going is not going to be easy for the DMK and its allies in Elections 2024. Despite the seats sweepstake in the 2021 assembly polls, the vote-share difference of 5.6% (DMK's 45.38% versus AIADMK-BJP's 39.72%) is not insurmountable on a bad day, points out N Sathiya Moorthy.
The AIADMK's staying power is not in question, but it has to regain the winning streak. That will require its leaders and leadership to re-wire themselves, to be able to re-think situations in ways different from what they had been accustomed to, suggests Sathiya Moorthy.
Finance Minister P T R Palanivel Thiagarajan has proclaimed his determination to set Tamil Nadu's fiscal house in order in five years, and Friday will show how he plans to go about it when he rises to present the Stalin government's maiden budget, says N Sathiya Moorthy.
Indications are that Modi will have words of encouragement for Stalin, and the meeting is likely to be much less acrimonious than critics of either would want it to be. notes N Sathiya Moorthy.
In Karunanidhi's passing the real loser is Tamil Nadu and Tamil language. So far there is no one on the horizon to fill the vacuum left behind by him, says R Rajagopalan.
The revived factionalism in the AIADMK, if not curbed now, has the potential to split the party vertically, warns N Sathiya Moorthy.
Chief Minister Stalin seems to have drawn a line between his personal beliefs and those of others in the family, beginning with wife Durga Stalin, observes N Sathiya Moorthy.
For Prime Minister Narendra Modi to dig up the perceived past of the DMK rival, now under a new leader in M K Stalin, may not gel with the voters, both old and new. If they are still going to vote for the AIADMK-BJP combine, it will be for entirely different reasons, and despite Modi's poll speeches, says N Sathiya Moorthy.
Unlike the regimes of Jayalalitha, Palaniswami and Karunanidhi, ministers are actually getting to make decisions on their own, with the unmentioned rider that they would be held responsible and accountable, observes N Sathiya Moorthy.
MK Stalin's ruling AIDMK rival does not thankfully face such problems as he did, but its problems could be worse if saner counsel does not prevail between now and the assembly polls, warns N Sathiya Moorthy.
A time has thus come when state encouragement for rural students led to empowerment of the socio-economically marginalised sections of the population. It included women. Today, with greater exposure and consequent enlightenment, it has gone beyond 'empowerment' to become 'entitlement', says N Sathiya Moorthy.
Stalin has given due respect to seniority in the pecking order, but has also taken into consideration the demands of individual ministries and the suitability of individuals, observes N Sathiya Moorthy.
'If they really wanted to give him competition, the AIADMK should have contested the seat, not its ally the PMK.'
From Chief Minister EK Palaniswami to Seeman to TTV Dhinakaran to elder brother M K Azhagiri, everyone's favourite target these days seems to the DMK chief Stalin, which is good news in an election year, but that doesn't mean he is going to sweep the polls, says N Sathiya Moorthy.
For a party that has adopted the successful social re-engineering model from Gujarat, Rajasthan and across the rest of the 'Hindi belt' over the past decades, Tamil Nadu continues to remain a tricky customer, says N Sathiya Moorthy.
By getting the Tamil Nadu assembly to act on his very imaginative public declaration to keep petro-chemical industries out of the Cauvery delta, which has traditionally been a DMK stronghold, Chief Minister Edappadi K Palaniswami has not only set the ball rolling for the assembly elections due a year later but also sent out a strong message to the BJP government at the Centre, which took a unilateral decision to exempt petro-complexes from environmental clearance, says N Sathiya Moorthy.
With Kiran Kumar Reddy adamant that he will step down as the chief minister of Andhra Pradesh after the announcement on Telangana is made, the Congress is exploring the option of bringing Konijeti Rosaiah, the former CM back to the state to head the government. Vicky Nanjappa reports.
'Just tell me who gave you the money and how much. I won't tell anyone that you told me,' the policemen tells the young lady voter. 'You think they give their name and address when they give you money?' she replies.
While critics and protestors have multifarious arguments to offer, the defence of CAA has been uni-dimensional and uni-focussed as has been the case with most policies of the Modi government and the political positions of his party. But to be drawn into an issue that has assumed more than local and national dimensions, Rajini has knowingly or otherwise, taken the plunge and in favour of the BJP -- or, so it has come to be seen, says N Sathiya Moorthy.
'It may take the AIADMK much more convincing than already, not only to try and bring around even the one-time Muslim voters of the party. 'More importantly, the party leadership may find it even more difficult to convince traditional party voters and cadres, who had admired Jaya's nonchalance to the party and leader ruling the Centre,' says N Sathiya Moorthy.
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