Congress weighed dumping DMK before Tamil Nadu polls

E-PaperSubscribeSubscribeEnjoy unlimited accessSubscribe Now! Get features like On Monday, even as it became clear that actor C Joseph Vijay’s Tamilaga Vettri Kazhagam (TVK) would emerge the single largest party in Tamil Nadu, some Congress leaders were sporting “we told you so” looks. TVK chief and Tiruchirappalli East constituency candidate Vijay. (PTI)HT has confirmed with at least three key party functionaries that in the run-up to the election, the Congress seriously considered dumping long-term ally Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam and going with Vijay . And the party still sees the opportunity to partner with the start-up. ““I think that if he falls short of majority, we will still back him. But yes, we could have shared power with him,’’ said a Congress leader who asked not to be named. Vijay’s TVK won 107 seats with a vote share of 35%. The Congress’ leaders said they would like to support TVK but it was unclear if Vijay was going to lean towards them. “We are the single largest party and so the governor will invite us to form government. When asked to show our numbers on the floor of the house, we will decide whose support to accept,’’ said a TVK spokesperson. Perhaps because the Congress explored options before the elections, the two-decade old alliance between it and DMK saw a fair share of friction during the campaign. There were no joint rallies or appearances featuring Chief Minister MK Stalin and Congress leader Rahul Gandhi. Even after the results, Gandhi posted a message just congratulating Vijay and not saying a word about his allies, DMK or Stalin. “It is true that TVK was in touch with us till the last minute, offering us 75 seats,’’ said a second Congress leader, a member of Parliament, adding: “This was an issue that divided the party and eventually, it was a collective decision to stay with the DMK.” A second MP said Vijay’s line of communication was through Girish Chodankar, the general secretary of the party instead of with the top leaders like Rahul Gandhi or Mallikarjun Kharge. Neither MP wanted to be identified. The DMK agreed to give the Congress 28 seats to contest; the Congress won 5 of these. “Our leader has said in a public meeting that it is the TNCC president who was influenced by DMK to not enter an alliance with us,’’ said the TVK when asked about his party’s alliance offer It’s easy to see why a section of the party favoured ditching the older ally. The DMK (and also the AIADMK) have always contested as part of an alliance, but insisted on forming governments on their own. The Congress was also tempted by its own internal surveys that clearly indicated that Vijay would get a sizeable voteshare. However, eventually, the top leadership favoured staying with chief minister MK Stalin. “The logic was simple-- we had to back Stalin’s ideology. If Rahul Gandhi was taking on the BJP at the centre, it was Stalin who was taken on that ideology in the state,” the first Congress leader said. The party reasoned that Vijay, with his apolitical worldview didn’t align with their ideas. And it turned out to be a major miscalculation. They didn’t account for the extent of the voters’ anger against the establishment. As the people of Tamil Nadu rejected the established Dravidian parties of DMK and AIADMK, opting instead to invest their hope in the newcomer, the Congress will again have to figure out how it went wrong with its calculations -- again! Sunetra Choudhury is the National Political Editor of the Hindustan Times. With over two decades of experience in print and television, she has authored Black Warrant (Roli,2019), Behind Bars: Prison Tales of India’s Most Famous (Roli,2017) and Braking News (Hachette, 2010). Sunetra is the recipient of the Red Ink award in journalism in 2016 and Mary Morgan Hewett award in 2018.Read More