CHENNAI: Tamil Nadu's voters, known for their five-year itch to hand landslide support to the opposition, stuck to convention on Friday, granting the AIADMK a thumping win.
It left the DMK devastated and its ally, the Congress , pondering its future in the state and the fate of their alliance in the balance after the severe drubbing .
The grand old party, which arm-twisted the DMK into giving it 63 seats, struggled to reach double-digits. While the AIADMK strode emphatically towards the 200-seat count in the 234-member assembly, celebrations on Chennai's streets — sizzling in the peak summer sun — looked disproportionately sedate. The presumption: Many of the 40 million-odd voters who were pampered with subsidised rice and free colour televisions by the DMK government watched the DMK-Congress combine's collapse on those very TV screens, with a full belly.
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| AIADMK leader J. Jayalalithaa waves to her party supporters while standing on the balcony of her residence in Chennai on Friday, as the results of state assembly elections became known. AFP |
The bustle, instead, was at Poes Garden where Puratchi Thalaivi (Revolutionary Leader) J Jayalalithaa basked in victory, and party workers, office-seekers and plain admirers thronged her premises.
The thalaivi did not disappoint them, giving an occasional darshan. She had extra reason this time to beam from the balcony: This is the first time the AIADMK is thrashing the DMK without the benefit of any wave of emotion or sympathy, as had been the case in 1991 following Rajiv Gandhi's murder, and in 2001 when she garnered some sympathy by alleging that the opposition parties were indulging in a witch hunt against her.
Having won, Jaya has her work cut out. She herself admits that there is an enormous amount of work to be done: "One has to clear the debris before beginning reconstruction of the house. The damage wrought by the DMK government is beyond description and we have an enormous task on hand," she says.
DK Srivastava, director and professor of the Madras School of Economics, feels Jaya is lucky as TN finances are in reasonable good shape in comparison to those of other states. "TN being a manufacturing state, the first thing that Jaya should look at is the state of infrastructure. She should plan more for investments towards infrastructure . She must also see to the issue of moving on to preparing the state for implementation of goods and services tax,” says Srivastava. Agriculture will be one area that will call for Jayalalithaa's close attention.
Tamil Nadu's agriculture growth is below the national average. To arrest the situation and help farmers, Srivastava feels the new government should invest in agriculture, irrigation and power.
In the electoral battle, the final analysis appeared to show that sops had no traction in changing voter attitude as the 2G spectrum scam appeared to taint the DMK, and its backlash, followed the party's candidates even into the rural areas.
At 8 pm, deputy chief minister and son of chief minister Karunanidhi, MK Stalin was struggling against Sadai SA Duraisamy of the AIADMK with a lead of only 1,000 votes in Kulathur constituency, while finance minister K Anbazhagan of DMK was trailing by 8,000 votes against JCD Prabhakar of AIADMK. In A Raja's home town, Perambalur, DMK's M Prabhaharan lost by 19,000 votes to his AIADMK opponent R Tamizhselvan. TNCC president KV Thangabalu was a major casualty, losing at Mylapore to R Rajalakshmi of AIADMK by over 29,000 votes.
In the final analysis, the corruption issue appeared to cloud out what the DMK believed had been a creditable performance on its part over five years.
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