THE DRAVIDIAN MOVEMENT -- THE 80s Part 1

Recently a friend asked me to pen a brief history of the Dravidian movement in this blog. After thinking over how to start, I decided I could do no better than to copy George Lucas in his Star Wars sequence. I will therefore devote 3 separate blogs to the 80s 90s and the 21st century to date respectively and will then go back to a "prequel" encompassing the period prior to the 80s.

The Lok Sabha Elections of 1980:

India went to the polls in 1980 to elect a new Lok Sabha. At the centre, a resurgent Congress (I) with Indira Gandhi at the helm was seeking to regain power. Facing them was a ragtag grouping. The once mighty Janata Party had split. Charan Singh's Lok Dal (comprising his original BLD faction and most of the erstwhile Socialist Party) was contesting the election separately from the rump Janata Party which essentially consisted of the erstwhile Jan Sangh and the Congress (O).

In 1980, M.G. Ramachandran was a figure regarded with great suspicion by Indira Gandhi. She had never quite forgiven him for letting her down in the Thanjavur by-election a couple of years earlier due to pressure from Morarji Desai. The period also coincided with the ascent in the Tamilnadu Congress of G.K. Moopanar, a power broker extraordinaire who right through his political career was perceived to be closer to Karunanidhi than to M.G.R. Moopanar's influence on Indira Gandhi led her to tie up with the DMK for the election. The AIADMK tied up with the Janata Party (practically non-existent in Tamilnadu).

Indira Gandhi stormed back to power. In Tamilnadu, the DMK-Congress (I) alliance did spectacularly well winning 37 out of the 39 seats on offer. Fresh from this victory, Moopanar prevailed on Indira Gandhi to dissolve the state assembly on the specious charge of corruption. Fresh elections were announced.

The backlash:

MGR's first government (from 1977 to 1980) was ironically comparitively clean by Tamilnadu standards. The dismissal of his government on the charge of corruption could hardly stand the test of credibility given the public's memory of the rampant corruption during the earlier Karunanidhi era.

The DMK and Congress approached the 1980 assembly elections with a supreme overconfidence that emerged from the Lok Sabha elections held barely 3 months earlier. The results were a devastating rebuff for the overconfident allies. MGR was swept back to power with a large majority. Karunanidhi himself actually had a major scare in his Anna Nagar seat barely squeaking through by a narrow margin of approximately 800 votes against Dr H.V Hande who then became a minister in the MGR government.

The second MGR Government:
Having been sacked for corruption after leading a comparitively clean government during his first innings, MGR gradually moved closer to the Congress which was only to happy to hitch its wagon to the winning horse. He consciously decided to cultivate the image of a "man of the people". The reality was rather debatable but the image decidedly stuck. The introduction of the noon-meal scheme in the state was a signal achievement of MGR's that forever consolidated his pro-poor image amongst the people.

Again, thanks to the earlier clean administration, people did not seem to be ready to believe MGR to be capable of corruption although by all accounts his second term in office quickly broke new marks in the corruption index. It was said during this period that he covered his tracks by asking all favour seekers to first meet Karunanidhi, then the opposition leader, and pay him money first. He would then demand from them about 4 times the amount that Karunanidhi demanded ! He thus ensured that the DMK would never raise any corruption charges in a credible way.

Along with the pro-poor image and the corruption came increasing evidence of high-handedness and thuggery. The police were given a free-hand (too free a hand according to a number of critics). The press was bludgeoned into submission (sometimes literally). A photo-journalist who dared to take a photograph of MGR when he had removed his trademark dark glasses to clean them was pursued, thrashed black and blue and his camera film confiscated).

Dark years for the DMK:

During the 1980 to 1984 period, the DMK had to fight for its very survival. By the time 1984 came around, the party had been out of power for almost a decade. Karunanidhi was widely perceived to be aging rapidly and the dominance of MGR in the political scene in the state was so total (especially in the South and West which were the AIADMK's traditional bastions), that the very survival of the DMK as an entity seemed to be in doubt.

To Karunanidhi's credit, the DMK held on to a base vote share of 35 % right through the period. In fact, the DMK was actually getting ready to make a credible run for power in 1984 when all calculations were suddenly upended by two security guards in New Delhi

The Indira Gandhi Assassination and its impact in Tamilnadu:

In the aftermath of Operation Blue Star and the tremendous resentment created in the Sikh community as a result, two Sikh guards assassinated the then Prime Minister, Indira Gandhi in 1984, when the country was weeks away from a Lok Sabha election.

The result of the election was a historic Congress sweep, born out of the assassination and the pro-Rajiv Gandhi wave that followed. The AIADMK, now in allliance with the Congress, swept both the Lok Sabha and the Assembly elections that were held simultaneously.

The MGR Third Term (1984 to 1987):

MGR's health, never robust at the best of times, deteriorated sharply to the point where he suffered a series of strokes and became virtually confined to bed in a comatose state. The AIADMK became a party virtually split down the middle. The leading faction was led by MGR's close associate, R.M. Veerappan and the other faction was led by MGR's former film leading lady, Jayalalitha.

The two factions had already started jockeying for power a while earlier. Things reached such a pass that when the City transport buses in Chennai introduced an express service called the "V" service, pro-Jayalalitha ministers in the state Government forced the hapless chairman of the corporation to introduce a similar express service called the "J" service !

While MGR was lying comatose in hospital, powerful ministers belonging to the Veerappan faction are alleged to have forged his signature on important documents, files and government communiques. One of the most bizarre episodes in this period was a letter alleged to be signed by MGR sacking S. Thirunavukkarasu, one of the pro-Jayalalitha ministers in the cabinet when it was common knowledge that MGR at the time was probably incapable of even recognizing people, let alone deciding who to appoint or fire !

With MGR lying in hospital, the Moopanar group in the state Congress again made a calculation that it would be in the Congress interest to encourage a split in the AIADMK and attempt to return to power. Moopanar's arithmetic (which he was to get right many years later only) was fatally flawed but none of the players then realized the dire consequences of the games that the Congress played during this period.

Death of MGR:

MGR finally died in 1987 and Tamilnadu went berserk. Chennai was totally ravaged by mobs that smashed everything which was within reach and breakable. Virtually every traffic signal in the city was smashed by the mob. A group of AIADMK workers demolished the Karunanidhi statue on Mount Road, Chennai.

Desperate to project herself as MGR's real heir, Jayalalitha forced her way on to MGR's funeral cortege. Sensationally, she was physically thrown out of the cortege by a film actor, Deepan, then considered to be close to R.M. Veerappan. MGR was interred alongside the samadhi of Anna on beach road in Chennai and an era had come to an end.

(To be continued in Part 2)