Of brinjals, mangoes and politics

PMK continues to do what it does best-- vacillate

Five summers ago, I got myself invited to spend a day with Pattali Makkal Katchi founder S Ramadoss at his famous ‘Thailapuram thottam’ near Tindivanam for a profile I was to write. He was the perfect host, welcoming me with a ‘sombu’ of butter milk with herbs and later laying a table with all the non-vegetarian dishes I love. He stuck to a modest vegetarian diet. Between morsels of rice and vegetables grown in his pretty big backyard, Ramadoss spoke about his extended trysts with M Karunanidhi and J Jayalalithaa, his early days as a doctor, and the “necessity” that pushed him to launch the PMK. He took me on a conducted tour of the political training institute run by the PMK to give classroom lessons to aspiring politicians, and later to the farm which has more than a hundred species of herbs, shrubs and trees. I was fascinated by a very ripe brinjal, hanging pendulum-like from a thin stalk, right over a low barb that separated the vegetable garden from the rest of the farm. Its fall looked imminent, but it was very difficult to say which side of the fence the vegetable would land. My photographer colleague and I took a bet.We requested Ramadoss for an early morning photo shoot, when he goes for his walk in the farm. The leader was a sport, literally. At sunrise, there he was, in a yellow T-shirt, trousers and sneakers, aspring in his step. The photographer followed him, shooting well till the sun was up and beating down. Before we packed up, we went to see where the brinjal had landed. There it was, still hanging from the wrinkled stalk, above the fence. A mango, the PMK’s election symbol would have been a more ideal picture to symbolise the party, but the very position of the brinjal oscillating between the two sides of the fence couldn’t have been a truer symbolism of the PMK’s political stand, election after election. The party that Ramadoss founded in 1989 as a political progression of the Vanniyar Sangham he launched nine years ago has been historically been a fence-sitter. As the 15th Lok Sabha elections near, PMK is nothing more, nothing less. PMK leaders proudly say that no alliance in Tamil Nadu has won a majority of the 40 Lok Sabha seats (Tamil Nadu-39, Puducherry- 1) without its participation. But it could also be argued that PMK has been clever enough to be always with the winning combine. It drew a blank in the first two Lok Sabha polls its formation (1991and 1996), when it did not align with either of the big Dravidian parties. PMK’s date with power started in 1998, when it joined the BJP-led National Democratic Alliance along with the AIADMK to bag four seats in the Lok Sabha. The next year, when Jayalalithaa pulled the rug from under the NDA’s feet and DMK rushed to roll the red carpet for BJP, PMK stayed put in the new NDA and got five MPs. The 14th Lok Sabha polls saw the PMK joining the DMK-led Democratic Progressive Alliance which in turn became a constituent of the United Progressive Alliance at the Centre. The PMK’s score in Tamil Nadu went up to six and also got the lone Pondicherry seat. As parties fuel their poll wagons for the 15th Lok Sabha elections, PMK continues to keep everyone guessing. After its “constructive rebellion” as a DPA constituent and the eventual exit from the alliance, PMK has been playing the cat-on-the-wall role perfectly. Despite the barbs he exchanged with Karunanidhi occasionally, there was this general feeling that Ramadoss may finally sail with the DMK combine. It was only yesterday that Congress leader Ghulam Nabi Azad who visited Chennai said PMK is very much part of the UPA. And then, two things happened today (March 06, 2009, Friday). PMK’s mouthpiece ‘Tamil Osai’ carried an editorial blasting both the Congress and the DMKfor trying to use alliances for selfish needs. The crux of the editorial: The Congress has forgotten the fact that it cannot come to power on its own. Regional parties joined the alliance not to strengthen the Congress, but to expand its own horizons. The DMK too has forgotten alliance dharma. Hours after the party newspaper hit the stands, Anbumani Ramadoss told a press conference that the UPA would come retain power. Confused? Well, that’s what Ramadoss wants everyone, including his prospective allies and rivals to be. I don’t know which side of the fence the ripe brinjal finally fell. But I know summer is the season of mangoes.