After tsunami, it's politics over relief

If there is a natural calamity, can politics be far behind? Tsunami might have claimed the highest toll of human life Tamil Nadu has ever seen, but there is also the living to worry about""and the way they will vote in the state Assembly elections, due in April 2006.

The rumblings have begun. The K Karunanidhi-led DMK and the J Jayalalithaa-led ADMK are jostling with each other to find a place in the consciousness of the "half real life, half imaginary" persona of the voter whose political ideas are ruled by television and movie propaganda.

The Sun television network ""owned by the Maran family so its loyalties are obvious ""is insistently putting out that the government has no road map for relief and rehabilitation.

Some of its exposes""like the fact the relief was tardy in reaching Kanya-kumari because the roads had been washed away, and the subsequent reshuffle of the district administration""appear to have struck an exposed nerve.

Former Bharatiya Janata Party MP and editor of the popular magazine Thuglak, Cho Ramaswamy, has editorially criticised the Sun television network for its biased coverage, a charge that the network is proud of. "We must be doing something right," one of its reporters said.

Chief Minister Jayalalithaa on the other hand, at the moment, is just administering"" money, relief, sources.

Unexpectedly, there is not a cheep from the chief minister about the Centre's position that India does not need foreign aid, that it has enough resources to manage rehabilitation on its own.

DMK activists say she will use the Centre versus the state government card later ("Who came to your aid during the tsunami? Union Finance Minister P Chidambaram initially said the economic cost was not substantial, and later, the Centre even refused help from those who wanted to help. It is the ADMK that came to your aid").

Prime Minister Manmohan Singh's U-turn, as a DMK activist put it, at the Pravasi Bharatiya Divas, that any help would, in fact, be welcome, will hopefully limit the damage. But there has been damage, they admit and wonder when Jayalalithaa will start using that card.

The DMK is countering this by aggressively charging that relief is not reaching everyone ""it is, in fact, going only to the wearers of the red-and-black bands, the signature colours of the ADMK. They say fishermen are banded together in cooperative marketing societies that are not overtly political but do have linkages with political parties. Accordingly, relief administered by the district administration is being directed to fisherfolk who wear the right colours.

In Nagapattinam, which has been for a long a CPI stronghold, the party is claiming that relief has been tardy in reaching some parts of the district. Activists say the ADMK fishing cooperatives are being given priority in relief.

At the one-hour meeting between Jayalalithaa and the Prime Minister last along with his entourage from the PMO and Planning Commission Deputy Chairman MS Ahluwalia, the chief minister demanded a Rs 5,000 crore central grant for erecting a 10 feet high wall all long the 1,500 km coastline that she feels will prevent future tsunamis.

The administration is being diplomatic about the workability of this measure. But the DMK was quick to poo pooh it. "And what will happen to the fishermen? This is not a practical idea," Karunanidhi's supporters say.

Instead, in his own meeting with the Prime Minister, Kalaignar, as Karunanidhi is addressed, has demanded in situ rehabilitation of fishermen as early as possible.

This is crucial ""because the other ace that Jayalalithaa has up her sleeve and will use unforgivingly, is that with 12 central ministers, it still took months for the central government to provide money and resources for rehabilitation.

The ADMK, obviously, has no minister at the Centre, but also no member in the Lower House of Parliament, you see, on account of losing all the Lok Sabha seats.

The tsunami has also had some repercussions in the internal politics of the DMK and the Congress. Although TR Balu is the seniormost minister and leader from the DMK, it is Dayanidhi Maran who has accompanied the two political honchos"" Manmohan Singh and Sonia Gandhi ""on their Tamil Nadu visits.

He is the face of tsunami relief. The Congress is even more miffed. According to them, by rights the two most senior leaders, GK Vasan and SR Balasubramaniam, should have been in the limelight. But the Congress in Delhi is lionising DMK leaders more than its own. This humiliates them in the eyes of their cadres and is not good for the party in the long run.

It is a matter of time before the DMK raises issues about corruption in relief. Then Jayalalithaa will play her cards. The tsunami after-effect is likely to influence the Assembly elections though the exact outcome is too early to predict.