By

Udaya Gammanpila

Jayalalithaa, the Chief Minister of Tamil Nadu commenced her election campaign by pasting a very interesting poster. Jayalalithaa has pointed a finger at President Rajapaksa and he was paying homage to her having knelt before her. In fact, this picture is a result of smart editing of two separate photographs. Jayalalithaa was addressing a meeting in one photograph and President Rajapaksa paying homage to the Sri Lankan land on arrival from Jordan soon after recording the military victory over the LTTE in the other photograph. The hidden message of this poster is that she intends to conduct her election campaign by bashing Sri Lanka.

Jayalalithaa took her second major steps in her election campaign by advising the State Governor to release the prisoners of the Rajiv Gandhi assassination case. Although the release of the prisoners was stayed by the Supreme Court of India, her decision is a further confirmation that the focus of her campaign is Sri Lanka. In fact, Jayalalithaa has contradicted herself by attempting to release Rajiv’s killers. When the Sri Lankan Government signed a CeaseFire agreement with the LTTE in 2002, Jayalalithaa got a resolution passed by the Tamil Nadu State Assembly demanding the Sri Lankan Government to hand over Prabhakaran to India to be tried for the Rajiv assassination. There must be a special reason for her sudden policy shift.

During the last phase of the war against the LTTE, Jayalalithaa was the Leader of the Opposition in Tamil Nadu. She then defended the war saying “the end of the war would be a great relief to the Tamil people although Sri Lanka is duty bound to protect the rights of the Tamils There was a reason for her behaviour. LTTE Leader, Prabhakaran was an ardent supporter of her arch rival Karunanidhi. However, all of sudden she has commenced to level allegations of war crimes at Sri Lanka by claiming Sri Lanka committed war crimes during the last phase of the war. In this backdrop, an explanation is warranted for Jayalalithaa’s duplicity.

Political crisis

Jayalalithaa is presently in a political crisis. On the one hand, there is the ever increasing cost of living. On the other hand, there are credible corruption charges against her. The newly formed anti-corruption Aam Aadmi Party, in a recent protest rally held on 15 February declared that the government had increased taxes to cover up the corruption and wastage which resulted in the higher cost of living.

When Jayalalithaa was in the Opposition, she was subject to a lot of corruption charges against her. There were law suits against her even after her election to the post of Chief Minister. After both Jayalalithaa’s adopted son Sudhakaran and her best friend Sashikala deserted her, they exposed corruption scandals of Jayalalithaa. Thereafter, the media began to question the source of the accumulated wealth of Jayalalithaa, Sashikala and Sudhakaran. The extravagance of the wedding of Sudhakaran and the granddaughter of Sivaji Ganeshan was a hot topic in the media for several months. As a result, the government filed action against both Jayalalithaa and Sashikala for corruption. Jayalalithaa’s corrupt past coupled with the ever increasing cost of living has posed a serious challenge to her.

Nationalist rhetoric

Jayalalithaa has decided to use nationalist rhetoric to suppress the burning cost of living issues and corruption charges. That is why she sheds crocodile tears for the LTTE which was hated by her when it was active. Similarly, that is why she attempts to release the assassins of Rajiv Gandhi who are in prison, although she had been campaigning for trying Prabhakaran for the assassination.

Jayalalithaa’s strong anti-Sri Lanka stand has put communal minor parties such as Pattali Makkal Katchi of Ramdoss, Tamil National Movement of P. Nedumaran, Marumalatchi Dravida Munnetra Kazagam of Vaiko into a pathetic situation. Those parties have always survived in the polity by standing for Sri Lankan Tamils. As Jayalalithaa has robbed their solitary slogan, they have become helpless without a slogan. Further, Jayalalithaa’s new stand has pushed Karunanidhi who had been the traditional voice for the LTTE towards further extremism, for survival. In this backdrop, all Tamil Nadu political parties will compete with each other for bashing Sri Lanka in the election campaign. This may lead the Indian Government towards taking a tough stand against Sri Lanka.

Governmental power

The Indian Lower House, Lok Sabha consists of 545 members. Accordingly, any political Party needs at least 273 members to secure governmental power. However, the ruling Indian Congress has only 206 members in the present Parliament. Hence, it depends on several State and minor parties to conduct the government. There has been a trend of State parties getting more influential in Indian politics for the last three decades. Therefore, it has been forecast that neither the Indian Congress nor the Bharathiya Janata Party will get more than 200 Members of Parliament. Meanwhile, anti-corruption Aam Aadmi Party, which made a significant gain at New Delhi State elections, has become a trend setter throughout India. Further, the leftist Parties along with several regional Parties have formed an alliance called the Third Front. In this backdrop, the two main Parties have further been weakened, increasing the importance of regional Parties.

Tamilnadu has 39 members in the Indian Parliament. There are five States that have more parliamentarians than Tamil Nadu, namely, Uttar Pradesh (80), Maharashtra (48), Andra Pradesh (42), West Bengal (42) and Bihar (40). However, the major parties dominate these States except Andra Pradesh and Tamil Nadu. Hence, Tamil Nadu is the second most important State in post-election negotiations for forming a government.

In this backdrop, not only the Indian Congress and the BJP, but also the Third Front will have to dance to the tune of Tamil Nadu in framing a Sri Lanka policy. In fact, with the ever growing influence of regional political parties, the tail wags the dog in Indian politics instead of the dog wagging the tail. It is indeed not in India’s favour in long term. Unfortunately, Indian politicians make decisions keeping the next election in mind instead of the next generation. As a result, there is a risk of Sri Lanka becoming India’s Cuba. India should not forget that the USA is still suffering because of its hostile attitude towards Cuba. The USA’s interference with internal affairs of Cuba forced it to be an ally of the USA’s rival, the USSR enabling it to install Soviet missiles at the doorstep of the USA.

Indian diplomats and political critics always complain that Sri Lanka is moving towards China. It is not true. Neither is Sri Lanka going towards China nor is China dragging Sri Lanka towards it. What is happening is Sri Lanka is pushed towards China by India. Although drastic consequences of this move have been understood by Indian intellectuals, power hungry politicians would never realize it.

The domination by Tamil extremism in Tamil Nadu and the increasing influence of Tamil Nadu in Indian national politics is extremely dangerous for Sri Lanka. In this backdrop, India will further harass Sri Lanka in international fora to appease Tamil Nadu. Therefore, Sri Lanka should prepare to survive in a more unfavourable international atmosphere after Indian parliamentary elections.

COURTESY:Ceylon Today