DMK in denial

Tamil Nadu chief minister M Karunanidhi must be congratulating himself at his own political nimbleness that a day after his elder son M Azhagiri was sworn in as a Cabinet minister at Delhi, he appointed his favourite younger son, Stalin as the deputy chief minister in Chennai and effectively his political heir in the party and in the government.

But what is good for the family may not be good for the party or indeed the state. Though dynasties in politics is now a fact of life in India and party workers have come to accept the ascension of sons and daughters, Karunanidhi has taken the idea too far. He has imposed children from sundry wives, nephews and others on the UPA and now on his own DMK, turning the party into a family concern.

It is unfortunate that Karunanidhi who is among the pioneers of the DMK, a rationalist and atheistic party, should succumb so helplessly to dynastic politics. He is being untrue to both himself and all those comrades who fought for politics of a different kind. The DMK was an idea, a movement created to fight against the dominance of Brahmins in Tamil Nadu. Much before the OBCs asserted themselves in north India, the DMK gave voice to backward castes in the south.

But things went awry somehow and Karunanidhi, who took over the party after the death of Annadurai in 1969, never let go of the presidentship. Clearly, he never felt the need to follow inner party democracy and when the need arose to name a successor, instead of leaving it to the party he has abrogated that right himself and has not been able to look beyond his son. This is why the DMK has seen the departure of many a capable leader in the last few years.

Karunanidhi can easily argue that he is hardly alone in foisting a child as the party’s boss; others have done it too. But making Stalin the deputy chief minister is way too brazen and the last one to do this, Prakash Singh Badal of the Akali Dal, paid heavily at the hustings because the voters just could not accept such an office being conferred on Sukhbir Singh Badal. With state assembly elections to be held soon, the DMK should start worrying about the impact of Karunanidhi’s kin.

Indian democracy can hope to have progressed only when it can move beyond the dominance of a bunch of families over Indian politics. A Tony Blair in Britain and a Barack Obama in the US can never hope to emerge in Indian politics as long as parties do not allow inspired and talented outsiders to take up the reins and bring in new ideas. The new Indian Parliament has more than its quota of sons and daughters of established politicians — including Karunanidhi’s — and the same is happening at the state level. Who cares what the cadre or the people think?