DMK Falls Off Political Radar After First Phase; INDI Allies Don’t Seem To Notice

As the long-drawn election across the country is veering to a close, the view from Tamil Nadu, which went to polls in the first phase on 19 April, is very distant.

People have moved on to other things, and the general perception in the state is that the DMK (Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam) which will sweep the bulk of the seats in the state.

But even if the party wins the state for the INDI Alliance, there is a school of thought that the DMK chief may have lost out in asserting himself as a pan-South leader (if not pan-Indian) by campaigning in other states.

The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), on the other hand, made use of its state chief K Annamalai's rising graph by deploying him into the campaign in both Kerala and Karnataka and even Maharashtra and beyond. 

The 2011 batch IPS officer too acquitted himself adequately with a confident approach. 

The BJP seems to have in mind a national role for him in the future, and that is why it is testing him across different geographies. 

That he is well educated and articulate — two qualities that mostly appeal to the middle-class voters who seem to dominate the discourse — adds some girth to Annamalai's political CV.

Now, the BJP is also building up Annamalai to be a challenger to Stalin when the state goes to assembly elections in 2026. A lot of it depends on what happens in this national election and also what transpires over the next 24 months. 

But the BJP seems to have given a head-start to Annamalai by backing him to the hilt and building him as a leader with an appeal across states.

It is here that the DMK has found itself to be lacking in imagination. 

Even though the party has been talking itself to be the fulcrum of the anti-BJP forces in southern India, it has failed to take charge in a manner that would back that claim. 

The party did not show any faith and try to pitchfork Stalin or for that matter any of its leaders, to campaign for the INDI Alliance in other states.

The Current Crop Of DMK Leaders Lack Charisma

The problem for the DMK is that there isn't any leader in its fold who has the political and intellectual wherewithal to make an impact outside the boundaries of the state. 

Stalin has done well to maintain his hold in the party since his father M Karunanidhi passed away in August 2018. But beyond that, the consensus is, he has failed to impress as a leader even within the state. 

The problem for Stalin is that he is not a skilled orator while his father earned his spurs as an emotive and effective public speaker. Stalin is prone to gaffes that have become fodder for the meme factories. Also, unfortunately his health condition doesn't allow him to be a more forceful performer on the stage.

His son Udhaynidhi Stalin, who notoriously hit the headlines with anti-Sanatana Dharma remarks, also seems no better. Despite being a nominal film actor, skills that can come in handy on public stage, Udhayanidhi lacks the charisma to hold sway over the public. 

Kanimozhi, supposedly the party's English-speaking face, has had her image tarnished by the 2G scam (even though technically the courts have not found her guilty). That also rules her out. Not that she has shown any great flair for leadership roles.

The other leaders like T R Baalu, A Raja are at best rabble-rousers and would not hold appeal elsewhere.  In any case, the DMK wouldn't have liked to field anybody outside of the family (lest they begin to grow and become a force in their own right). 

The plight of Vaiko when he was V Gopalasamy and emerged as a star speaker in the DMK ranks can be a sobering recall in this context. He was manoeuvred out by Karunanidhi when he started to take tentative roots as a leader in his own right.

To be fair, it is not as if Tamil Nadu has a rich history of its past leaders making a mark in other states, especially during poll times. But the likes of M G Ramachandran, Karunanidhi and J Jayalalithaa did have the stature to be taken seriously in other places. 

MGR and Jayalalithaa, being actors, had an added advantage. The latter was particularly quite versed in other southern languages to at least speak a few lines of Kannada or Malayalam or Telugu. Stalin and his son, alas, don't have those skills. So their presence is limited and low-key within the confines of the state alone.  

It is equally pertinent to point out here that the other parties of INDI bloc did not find the DMK leaders to fit the bill in their campaign. 

Udhayanidhi, with his abrasive comments on Sanatana Dharma, had virtually put the Congress in a major spot in the rest of the nation. If it had carried him around, that would have proved to be a major liability to the Congress.

The Contradictions Within INDI Bloc

Also, the confusions and complexities of politics within the INDI bloc would have anyway put paid to even putative ideas to have DMK leaders outside the state. 

For instance, hypothetically speaking, if Stalin had gone to Kerala, who would he have campaigned for? The Left front or the Congress front? The two are together in an alliance with the DMK in Tamil Nadu. But they face off against each other in Kerala. 

Stalin is also proving to be a reluctant leader. He is not keen to seize the moment. Post the campaign, he seems  to have gone into a shell. 

He took a holiday of sorts in Kodaikanal after the polling in the state — no one would grudge him that after the gruelling electioneering. But back after the holiday, his public presence has become limited. 

Statements arrive from his table, but beyond that he seems to be a leader in absence. Ditto with his son Udhayanidhi. 

With the poll prediction being favourable to his party (even if the INDI bloc isn’t finding the going good), it made more sense for Stalin to make a grand show elsewhere and build some momentum for himself ahead of 2026 contest.

In a sense, Stalin is frittering away the gains that his party made in the time of Karunanidhi. 

It is impossible not to think how Karunanidhi would have tailored his politics in such situations. The man would have kept himself busy with thousand statements and myriad appearances where he would have dropped intriguing political bytes that would have provided grist to the future-gazers. 

It would have kept alive every kind of possibility in the political theatre. He would have seized every chance that would have kept him at the centre of focus. That is the hallmark of any smart politico, and Karunanidhi was decidedly one. 

Stalin has just retreated to the dugout. By ceding crucial space, he is only providing more opportunity for someone like Annamalai to make headway. 

Even if the 2024 general election in the state goes Stalin's way, the more pivotal (for him and the party) 2026 state election seems an arduous climb.