Chennai: The surprising big turnout for BJP national president Amit Shah’s rally in the city and the buzz it created has more do with the failures of the DMK and AIADMK than the organising skills of the saffron party members in the state. That the BJP sees a window of opportunity in the Dravidian heartland, that had kept national parties out of electoral contention in Tamil Nadu for decades since late 1960s, many feel, is a result of problems, precisely, corruption cases, the DMK and AIADMK are entangled in.
While nonagenarian Karunanidhi’s DMK is struggling to bounce back from successive poll defeats induced by the 2G ghosts and remains preoccupied in resolving internal bickering, the AIADMK is also going through a torrid time ever since its general secretary J.Jayalalithaa got convicted in the Bangalore disproportionate assets case. Even during BJP national president Amit Shah’s grand TN visit, the BJP had only managed to rope in businessman-politician Napoleon from the DMK and an apolitical Gangai Amaran and Gayatri Raghuram who had long retired from active cinema business.
That said, there is still a buzz around the BJP speaks for the failure of the DMK and AIADMK which had hit the headlines only for reasons not worth remembering of late.Ironically, it was these two Dravidian majors, mostly the DMK, that had harped on Periyar’s language and ethnicity based progressive Dravidian ideology to make life difficult for the national parties in the state, especially the Congress that had not got anywhere close to capturing Fort St George since losing it to its then arch rival DMK in 1967.
It is easily discernible that deviation from core ideology and nepotism were the undoing of both parties. Their forging alliance alternately with the Congress and BJP during various periods over the last four decades is a pointer to their digression from the core ideology. Seconding this view, CPM Rajya Sabha MP T.K.Rangarajan who describes BJP enthusiasm and opportunity as ‘mirage’ says; “There is no opportunity for the BJP here. Even their leaders are aware of it and hence their leaders smile.
But, it is natural to see their leaders excited because that is the only way to keep their cadres active.”“First the AIADMK forged alliance with BJP. Then MDMK and DMK followed suit. All three compromised their ideology, which stood for opposing communal party like BJP. Now, their follies have opened a space for a non-Dravidian party, which will most likely be the Left as 90 per cent of the voting working class in the state belongs to unorganized sector.”
