Let The Games Begin!

After a long gap, I am back to writing about Dravidian politics! Much has changed in the last one year in the political landscape of Tamil Nadu, however, the basic premise that the political pendulum will swing one way or the other still remains. So say observers. But will it...really?

Here's what is at stake

40 seats. Tamil Nadu will send 39 members to the 15th Lok Sabha. Add one more from Pondicherry. As has been in the past two elections, the DMK or the AIADMK led coalition is expected to swing the popular vote its way entirely. In 2004, the DMK Supermo Muthuvel Karunanidhi engineered a rainbow coalition of 15 parties and knocked-out the Jaya-BJP combine 40-0. The control over these 40 seats gave Karunanidhi the clout to get whatever he wanted from the UPA Government. For starters, he got all the ministries he wanted. He got ministers changed - A.Raja took Dayanidhi's place as IT & Telecom Minister, when the latter fell out of favour with the DMK leadership. He almost got the Sethusamudram Project cleared - with a very vocal TR Balu fighting in Parliament. Had it not been for the Govt's lawyers mucking up in Supreme Court even that would have been reality.

Bone of Contention - The Tamil EalemIssue

What has become a political rallying point is the UPA's handling of the Tamil Ealam issue. Karunanidhi has been pushing for greater intervention by the Govt of India in the battle between the LTTE and Sri Lanka, and rescue the Tamils caught in the crossfire. While Pranab Mukherjee visited Colombo at Karunanidhi's insistence, it was perceived merely as an act of symbolism and did not result in any material outcome. This was enough fodder for the disgruntled elements with the DMK led coalition partners to call it quits. Vaiko, the firebrand leader of the MDMK who has made no bones of his support of the Ealem cause, quit the DMK alliance before the assembly elections in 2006. Now, the eternal cat on the wall, Dr Ramadoss cited Karunanidhi's failure over the Tamil Ealem issue, among several others, as a reason to switch sides. He arrived at a seat sharing deal with Jayalalithaa recently.

Here's how it looks now

So you have the DMK + Congress and a few minor parties such as the Dalit Panthers led by Thol Thirumavalavan on one hand. The AIADMK + PMK + MDMK + Left on the other. Amma notched up a clever alliance with the left parties, who control 1 or 2 seats in the State.

There are two important players left - the BJP and DMDK led by Actor Vijaykanth. BJP is not a strong force in the State, but it is inevitable for one of the State coalitions to ally with NDA at the centre, if it comes close to forming the next government. But the real spoiler in this elections is going to be Vijaykanth and his DMDK. In the last assembly elections, DMDK debuted with a commendable 8 per cent vote share. While Vijaykanth has ruled out allying with both the coalitions, his strategy post the elections may be critical in deciding which electoral alliance from Tamil Nadu will call the shots at the centre.