Chennai, April 14: Tamil Nadu voted on Wednesday to elect a new Government for the State. Will Chief Minister and DMK president M Karunanidhi return to carry on? Or, will bitter rival and AIADMK general secretary J Jayalalithaa displace him?
The wait for the answer is, however, a long one month as the results would be known on May 13. Meanwhile, on Wednesday both leaders exuded confidence of their party’s victory and, even as they cast their votes in the morning, traded charges against each other.
Neither of them is contesting from Chennai city, but both cast their votes in the same constituency — Thousand Lights — in central Chennai, staying just about a kilometre from each other. Thousand Lights is a constituency held by Deputy Chief Minister and Karunanidhi’s son MK Stalin. But now he has moved to Kolathur constituency of north Chennai, traditionally an AIADMK bastion before delimitation changed the profile of the constituency.
“Our prospects are as bright as the Rising Sun (DMK’s symbol) and we will win as many seats as we require to form Government…It could either be our own or a coalition,” Karunanidhi said after casting his vote at the Sarada Secondary School near his house in Gopalapuram.
Jayalalithaa, casting her vote at Stella Mary’s College, said, “It’s not there was no corruption before. It’s there in every country of the world. But corruption of this scale is something unprecedented, which we have not witnessed until the DMK Government came to power. Although vast sums of money are being thrown around in this election, my information is that `5,000 crore is being spent by the DMK in this election. It will not have any impact on the people. People are determined to vote out the DMK Government and bring in AIADMK Government.”
But Karunanidhi countered it, “We will get working majority this time. Jayalalithaa’s campaigning was never based on her manifesto. People should understand this. She throughout her campaign was attacking my family. The Election Commission was non-partisan. It was Jayalalithaa who said that Election Commission officials are being threatened.”
This comes after all the accusation he had hurled against the plan panel and claimed it had made it look as if an emergency-like situation prevailed in Tamil Nadu!
Stalin is in fierce battle with AIADMK bigwig Saidai S Duraiswamy and both sides campaigned aggressively. Even Karunanidhi had to pitch in with the campaign for his son. On Wednesday, while polling was peaceful, both Stalin and Duraiswamy kept a vigil over the polling booths. Stalin arrived at the Jaigopal Garodia Matriculation Higher Secondary School booth in the morning and the gates were shut while he was inside. This was instantly reported by the AIADMK agents to Duraiswamy and by noon he was at the school to question why the gates were shut during Stalin’s visit.
In Mylapore constituency, Congress State president KV Thangkabalu made customary rounds of his constituency till 5 pm when polling ended. “Everything is going on fine,” he said. Not really. His wife Jayanthi Thangkabalu who had originally filed nomination as the official candidate for the constituency was unable to cast her vote as her name was not in the voters’ list!
In Madurai, Karunanidhi’s other son and Union Chemical Minister MK Alagiri dismissed all allegations of money power and bribing. He said that EC had been very strict and that his party had spent less than what was allocated by the EC. He said that his party would win 200 out of 234 seats in the Assembly.
Stalin echoed his brother’s calculation of a DMK win. “Our leader Karunanidhi has already made our stand clear on the working of Election Commission in Tamil Nadu. We are unhappy with the developments that have happened in the past two days. On Jayalalithaa’s accusations I want to say she more a leader of statements than a political leader and I am sure the DMK-led alliance will win at least 220 seats this time.”
——Agencies