Just Spamming | All That Hullabaloo Over Power Sharing

Landing in Chennai after saying goodbye to Parliament, MDMK founder Vaiko was talking about coalition rule in Tamil Nadu the other day. Of course he was discounting the possibility of a coalition government after the 2026 Assembly elections if the alliance in which his party was a part romps home. A minor alliance partner declaring that the coalition leader, the DMK, would form a government on its own bucked the modern trend of small parties seeking a share in power with the talk of coalition government gaining currency.

If that gives rise to a possibility of the next State government comprising a hotchpotch of parties, History informs us that the State has only been run by a single party after independence with almost all the regimes having a powerful leader at the helm. That means no one had thought about a coalition government, mainly because the ruling parties always had the numbers. Even in 2006 when the numbers were lopsided a balance was struck not by roping in the supporting parties into the DMK government, which was caustically and repeatedly referred to as the ‘Minority Government’ by the late AIADMK supremo J Jayalalithaa.

The DMK that went to the polls with a slew of allies and contesting in only 130 of the 234 seats individually managed to garner 96 seats, a number that fell too short of the halfway mark of 117. But the party leader M Karunandhi went ahead and formed the government, keeping the allies out of its fold, and completed the full term. Apart from the Congress and the two Communist parties, the DMK alliance had the PMK in it. But there was no open murmur of a demand for a slice in the power cake. If there was any muted demand, a canny Karunanidhi managed to deal with it effectively till the end.

Now, the same PMK is talking about demanding a share in power even without finalizing an alliance for the election, for which the bugle has been sounded one year in advance by various parties. Though the two Communist parties that are still in the same alliance have not openly made declarations seeking a share in the power pie, they have suggested that they are indispensable for the DMK to win the polls and come to power. Another ally, the VCK, has a few times openly evinced interest in being part of a coalition government, expressing it directly and indirectly.

It is in that context Vaiko averring that the DMK will form the government on its own in 2026 assumes significance. For it is seen as a message to the rest of the allies – apart from the seven parties that contested the 2024 Lok Sabha polls in the alliance, there are a few more smaller ones that would seek one or two seats in the Assembly elections – to not aspire for ministerial berths when their coalition recaptured power in the State. Whatever, it looks that the DMK-led alliance, too, has reckoned the idea of a coalition government becoming a future reality.

As far as the political dynamics in the other coalitions go, power sharing has become the dominant theme in the AIADMK-BJP alliance and threatens to become a bone of contention. While Union Home Minister and the BJP leader handling hassles relating to alliances and government formations, Amit Shah, has repeatedly said that it would be a coalition government in Tamil Nadu by calling it NDA rule, AIADMK general secretary Edappadi K Palaniswami is moving heaven and earth to establish that it would be a single party, read AIADMK, government.

That raises the question as to why Palaniswami, for whom an electoral tie-up with the BJP was acceptable, is averse to sharing power. If he is wary of the BJP gobbling up the entire coalition after coming to power, as it had happened in a few States, he would not have agreed to Amit Shah’s moves to rejuvenate the alliance and would not have definitely gone around defending the alliance that he is now doing. So what puts him off when it comes to a coalition government, which may be new to government formation in the State? But was it not the AIADMK that first introduced the concept of coalition to the State in 1979 when two of its nominees – Sathiavani Muthu and Aravinda Bala Pajanoor – were part of the short-lived Union Government led by Charan Singh?

The DMK, too, had been part of several coalition governments at the Centre, starting with Murasoli Maran becoming a Union Minister for Urban Development in the V P Singh government in 1989. Subsequently the NDA under A B Vajpayee and the decade long UPA governments saw a slew of DMK leaders occupying diverse Ministerial berths in coalition governments. But now the DMK does not want to share power with its allies in the State.

So how did this talk of a coalition government sneak into the political narrative? Perhaps it started with Tamilaga Vetri Kazhagam founder president Vijay adding a post script to his maiden political speech at his party’s launch in Vikravandi in February, 2024. He had said that he would consider accommodating allies in his government. If that planted the idea of grabbing a slice of power through coalition governments in the minds of small parties, Vijay has not yet agreed for any alliance with anyone, forget power sharing, so far.