Troubled alliance

The Congress-DMK relationship comes under strain, and the AIADMK does its utmost to try and break it.

ON November 18, Tamil Nadu Chief Minister M. Karunanidhi, Union Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee, Union Home Minister P. Chidambaram and Union Textiles Minister Dayanidhi Maran met in Madurai. The mood in the room was sombre, quite in contrast to the occasion that brought them together: the wedding of Karunanidhi's grandson and Union Minister for Fertilizers and Chemicals M.K. Alagiri's son Dayanidhi Azhagiri.

Sometime later, at the venue of the wedding, Pranab Mukherjee expressed confidence that the Congress-led United Progressive Alliance (UPA) government at the Centre would complete its term in office. The UPA had already completed six years and a half in office, he said. Pranab Mukherjee praised the role Karunanidhi had played in the UPA in crucial situations and declared: We are together.

The Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (DMK) president, on his part, expressed happiness at the huge gathering at the wedding and said it demonstrated the DMK's unity and strength, which was witnessed at this crucial hour by two important Congress leaders, Mukherjee and Chidambaram.

The need to demonstrate his strength to the Congress had become necessary for Karunanidhi in the light of the souring of ties between the two parties as a result of the 2G spectrum scam in the Department of Telecommunications that the DMK's A. Raja headed as Union Minister for Communications and IT. Having come under immense pressure, Raja had resigned his post four days earlier for his alleged role in the scam, which, according to the Comptroller and Auditor General's (CAG) report, resulted in a presumptive loss of Rs.1.76 lakh crore to the exchequer. But at the November 18 meeting, what apparently weighed heavily in the mind of the Chief Minister was the Congress decision to allot the portfolio to Human Resource Development Minister Kapil Sibal. DMK leaders claimed that the Congress had given an assurance that Prime Minister Manmohan Singh would take charge of the portfolio and restore it to a DMK nominee after the winter session of Parliament ended. A Congress leader admitted that the cordiality in the relationship between the two parties is gone.

The Congress-DMK alliance was all set to continue for the Tamil Nadu Assembly elections to be held in May 2011, but notwithstanding Pranab Mukherjee's assurance to the DMK in Madurai there is no guessing what the Congress will do now. In the battle of attrition between the two parties over the Raja issue, the DMK appears vulnerable. For, its rival, the All India Anna Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (AIADMK) headed by former Chief Minister Jayalalithaa, has signalled its intention to have the Congress as its ally.

Karunanidhi defended Raja stoutly, claiming that Raja was being pilloried because he was a Dalit. In May this year, Jayalalithaa accused Karunanidhi of shamelessly playing the Dalit card to neutralise Dalit leaders who insisted on Raja's resignation in Parliament. A.S.A. Karunakaran, DMK leader from Tirunelveli, said: When Dayanidhi Maran was the Union Minister for Communications and Information Technology, no allegations were made against him. But now allegations have been made [against Raja]. We are, however, confident that the final judgment will be in our favour. We will get justice.

On October 29, the Supreme Court, hearing a writ petition filed by the Centre for PIL in the spectrum scam, lambasted the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) for dragging its feet in the investigation. Justice A.K. Ganguly, who was a member of the two-judge Bench with Justice G.S. Singhvi, told Additional Solicitor General Harin Raval: The same Minister is still continuing. Is that the way the government is functioning? Is this the rule of law? Do you follow the same standards in respect of everyone? Justice Ganguly had more harsh words for Raval: Already one year has gone by. How long will you take? Another ten years to complete the investigation? It is slip-shod work. You are dragging your feet.

If the Supreme Court's caustic observations forced the Centre to get its act together on the Raja issue, the CAG was getting ready to submit its report to the Centre on the 2G spectrum allotment. The media, purportedly on the basis of information leaked from the report, went to town alleging that wrongdoing in the allotment of spectrum on a first-come, first-served basis to telecom companies had resulted in a loss of Rs.1.76 lakh crore to the exchequer.

It was against this backdrop that P. Chidambaram met Karunanidhi in Chennai on November 6 and conveyed the Congress high command's suggestion that Raja step down from office. The Chief Minister reportedly retorted that in that event he would ask all DMK Ministers at the Centre to resign.

The pressure increased on the DMK leadership when the Congress high command, on November 9, asked its Chief Minister in Maharashtra, Ashok Chavan, to resign for his role in the Adarsh Housing Society scandal and removed Suresh Kalmadi as the secretary of the Congress Parliamentary Party for his alleged role in various scams relating to the Commonwealth Games 2010 held in New Delhi.

Jayalalithaa's support

In Tamil Nadu, on November 10, Jayalalithaa asked the people of India to send a one-line telegram to President Pratibha Patil urging her to dismiss Raja. Soon thousands of AIADMK workers queued up at post-offices all over the State to send the telegram.

Jayalalithaa taunted the UPA by saying that it lacked the courage to demand his resignation. They are worried that such a precipitate demand would end up with Karunanidhi pulling out of the fragile UPA coalition, leading to its premature collapse, she said.

The next day, in an interview to a television channel, she made the Congress an offer. She said: As an opposition leader, I would say if the Congress is able to summon up the political will to act against Raja, I can show that the coalition does not have to collapse. In lieu of the 18 DMK members in the Lok Sabha, she proffered the support of nine AIADMK Lok Sabha members and nine more members from friendly parties. If the Congress wishes to avoid a mid-term poll, the numbers have to be matched up. I have spoken to some leaders of other parties. We have nine MPs in the Lok Sabha and between them other friendly parties have enough MPs to make up the 18 with one or two to spare. So what is holding the Congress back? she asked. Besides, she laid no conditions because she was only keen that a perpetrator of such a massive scam is not allowed to go scot-free simply because of the compulsions of coalition politics.

The AIADMK general secretary asked Congress president Sonia Gandhi to forget the past misunderstandings between them. My party is 38 years old and I have a political career of 28 years. When you spend so much time in politics, there are bound to be ups and downs, and there is bound to be a past. But in politics, if you keep harping on the past and looking back you cannot move forward, she advised Sonia Gandhi.

According to a political analyst, Jayalalithaa made the offer to the Congress to probe whether it was inclined to ally with the AIADMK in the Assembly elections and to build up confidence among the AIADMK cadre who were keen on such an alliance. If the Congress is not keen on renewing its ties with the AIADMK, then Jayalalithaa's plan is to gain time and edge by cobbling up a strong alliance with other parties and beginning an early campaign, the analyst said.

If the AIADMK's offer to the Congress made the DMK nervous, the Congress used it to mount pressure on the DMK to ask Raja to quit. Although Union Health Minister Ghulam Nabi Azad, who is the AICC general secretary in charge of Tamil Nadu, said that there is no vacancy in Tamil Nadu because the Congress had an alliance with the DMK, Congress spokesman Janardhan Dwivedi came up with a rider when he said, At the moment, it is very clear that the DMK is our very important alliance partner.

Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, who was returning from Seoul after attending the G-20 summit, also hedged his bets when he said on November 12, We are in alliance with the DMK and that alliance stands as of now. He said he was not aware of what Jayalalithaa had offered and added that it was for the Congress high command to take note of it.

Informed Congress sources said Manmohan Singh's comments were a signal to the DMK that Raja should not continue in the Union Cabinet anymore. With the Congress removing Ashok Chavan and Suresh Kalmadi but the DMK insisting that it will not ask Raja to resign, the credibility of the alliance was at stake, the sources said.

But the DMK tried to brazen it out. Karunanidhi pronounced that Raja is not guilty and that Raja had followed the procedures adopted by Pramod Mahajan and Arun Shourie when they were Ministers in the National Democratic Alliance (NDA) government at the Centre. The allocation was made on a first-come, first-served basis. There was no wrong allocation, Karunanidhi argued.

A brief meeting between Pranab Mukherjee and Kanimozhi, Karunanidhi's daughter and the DMK's member in the Rajya Sabha, gave rise to speculation that the DMK had sought a clarification from the Congress on Jayalalithaa's offer. Kanimozhi reportedly told Mukherjee that the DMK would not let down Raja.

Nevertheless, the Congress core committee meeting in New Delhi on November 14 decided that Karunanidhi should be told to ask Raja to resign. Manmohan Singh spoke to Karunanidhi and suggested that Raja quit. He also reportedly told the Chief Minister that he would send Pranab Mukherjee to Chennai to meet him.

Although Mukherjee did not come to Chennai, informed Congress leaders said he spoke over the phone to Karunanidhi three times, explaining the seriousness of the situation and why Raja should put in his papers. Karunanidhi reportedly wanted to know why Raja was being singled out in the issue.

The Chief Minister apparently insisted that in the event of Raja's' resignation, the Communications and IT portfolio should remain with the Prime Minister and should be restored to a DMK nominee at the appropriate time. All efforts by the DMK leadership to get in touch with Sonia Gandhi failed. On the same day, in the meantime, Raja met the DMK president twice. Karunanidhi consulted his senior colleagues, including Finance Minister K. Anbazhagan, and it was decided that Raja should be asked to resign as Minister.

Sources in the DMK said that while the Chief Minister was keen not to let down Raja, what worried him was Jayalalithaa's offer of support to the Congress. So he felt that the Raja issue should not embarrass the alliance. The Chief Minister felt that he should take careful steps to keep alive the DMK's alliance with the Congress for the Assembly elections. The CPI(M) and the CPI were already with the rival AIADMK. There is no predicting which way the unattached PMK [Pattali Makkal Katchi] will go. Vijaykant [founder of the Desiya Murpokku Dravida Kazhagam] was opposed to joining hands with the DMK. So our party president asked Raja to resign, a DMK insider said.

Congress sources pointed out that it was a minority DMK government that was being propped up by the Congress in Tamil Nadu. Karunanidhi is running a minority government here, so he cannot take risks. He did not want to antagonise the Congress. It is always better to face elections while in power. Karunanidhi, therefore, asked Raja to submit his papers, one of them explained.

But a combative Raja kept up a brave face for a few hours. He told reporters at the Chennai and New Delhi airports on November 14 that he had done nothing wrong and so he would not resign. Once in New Delhi, he drove to the Prime Minister's residence and submitted his resignation. And he told reporters, My conscience is clear and I have done nothing wrong. I did everything in accordance with law. He claimed that he had ushered in a revolution in the telecom sector as Communications and IT Minister.

Karunanidhi described Raja as the shining sun of the Dalit community, who was the epitome of duty, integrity and straight-forwardness in whatever he did. Although explanations were offered several times that Raja had only followed the procedures of 1999 in allotting spectrum to telecom companies, a few not only refused to accept these explanations but were adamant that Raja should resign, he said. Besides, they were disrupting proceedings in Parliament and the UPA government's administration. So Raja was advised to quit with a view to protecting parliamentary democracy, the Chief Minister said.

Jayalalitha moved quickly to claim credit for Raja's resignation and demanded his arrest and prosecution under the Prevention of Corruption Act. Raja's resignation came after a virtual avalanche of public opinion was mobilised after her interview to the television channel and the millions of telegrams that swamped the Rashtrapati Bhavan.

The resignation saw Karunanidhi and Jayalalithaa exchanging a fusillade of broadsides on setting up a JPC. The Chief Minister argued that the loss of Rs.1.76 lakh crore was based on presumption and he quoted from the CAG report that any loss ascertained while attempting to value the spectrum can only be presumptive. He asked: Is it fair to attempt to write the final judgment based on presumptive opinion'? But Jayalalithaa argued that the loss was not presumptive, only the amount was.