Edappadi Palaniswami laid bare the truth this week — If there is any party capable of effectively playing the role of opposition to the DMK government, it is the AIADMK. (PTI file)
In the coming months, as more thorny issues emerge for the DMK, the AIADMK will be equally tested—how it reacts to issues that place it in the role of the opposition
Former Tamil Nadu Chief Minister and AIADMK leader Edappadi Palaniswami laid bare the truth this week – if there is any party that can effectively play the role of opposition to the DMK government, it is the AIADMK.
Palaniswami could not have spoken truer words than this. In a way, he displayed world-wise political wisdom emanating from seasoned politicians like P Chidambaram, who said something similar ahead of the 2014 parliamentary elections about the Congress’s absolute ability to track down the BJP.
The recently concluded Erode East by-election in Tamil Nadu is an example of this. While it is true that the DMK won handsomely (by a margin of over 66,000 votes), it was clear from the way the election campaign was conducted that the AIADMK was supposed to be the main opposition party, with the BJP appearing to be an ardent irritant. to the ruling DMK.
This is also commendable because the AIADMK has been the significant and only competitor to the DMK’s might in Tamil Nadu for more than 50 years. The Indian National Congress has strong organizational and infrastructural field strength, but the party has not been able to fully utilize its strength over the years, partly due to heavy infighting.
The BJP’s growth story in Tamil Nadu is still ambivalent – strong in some regions but not yet snowballed into any kind of electoral strength (20 seats polled 2.62 per cent votes). A comparison of the vote percentages of the AIADMK and the DMK only applies that the electorate had given a certain level of approval to the AIADMK despite being in power for 10 years – 191 seats against the DMK’s 37.7 percent out of 188 33.29 percent.
And yet, all things considered, the AIADMK’s response to key issues in Tamil Nadu suggests a reluctance to play the “opposition role” as it should.
In the recent past, the DMK government found itself in a crossfire – to a large extent – on two issues. One is BJP chief K Annamalai’s “exposing” of corruption by the DMK’s ruling family – chief minister MK Stalin, minister Udhayanidhi Stalin, son-in-law Sabarisan, and others. The second is an audio purportedly of Finance Minister P Thiagarajan’s voice by a political observer and editor of digital political views and investigative journalism outlet Savukku. The BJP took advantage of Savukku’s “expose” to strengthen its DMK Files corruption campaign.
On both the issues, the AIADMK was speaking in a tone that was clearly not that of the opposition. While the AIADMK did not have much to say on the audio exposé, its response to the DMK files underlined its reluctance to take on the DMK head-on. The AIADMK, reeling under the burden of multiple corruption charges against its own ministers, reacted sharply to just one angle of Annamalai’s DMK Files speech that he would not spare any party in power. The AIADMK made the DMK Files campaign about itself, ignoring the fact that the target was the DMK, its principal opposition and, in many ways, the reason for its existence.
In the coming months, as more thorny issues emerge for the DMK, the AIADMK will be equally tested – how it reacts to issues that place it in the role of the opposition. What would Jayalalithaa have done?
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