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Caste-based politics to the fore in Tamil Nadu

N Sathiya Moorthy in Madras

Tamil Nadu seems to be going the way of Uttar Pradesh and Bihar and moving towards caste-based politics after decades of regionalism, if one looks at the concerted efforts to consolidate the scheduled castes on one side and the backward classes on the other.

For one, the voter mood is both ambivalent and demanding. For another, casteist forces are at work, appealing to sentiments and relating their cause to immediate local issues that make greater sense than noble ideas that sound distant, if not utopian.

The Tamil voter is willing to experiment, and increasingly impatient for results. With time and the attainment of certain goals, Congressism first, and Dravidianism now, have become irrelevant as political ideologies appealing to the younger set.

If proof is needed, it's there in the form of violent electoral swings between 1991 and 1996, and again in 1998. Immediate issues, not "isms", sell today. If Rajiv Gandhi's assassination sealed the Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam's fate in 1991, the All India Anna Dravida Munnetra Kazagham's misdeeds proved its undoing five years later. And this year, the unimpressive performance of the DMK state government and the United Front tamasha (drama) at the Centre were topped by the serial blasts in Coimbatore.

In 1996, the voter gave a fresh lease of life to the DMK, which had been written off five years earlier. Similarly, he was willing to accommodate, though not accept, the AIADMK in 1998, as shown by the low victory margins despite the Coimbatore blasts.

Possibly, in the absence of a convincing third force, the voter would rather play Russian roulette with the two Dravidian majors, without letting himself be taken for granted.

It is this space for a "third force" that is being fought for. On one side are the "nationalist" forces like the Bharatiya Janata Party and the Tamil Maanila Congress that proclaims itself a regional party with a national outlook. There is no denying the TMC's role in rekindling "Tamil self-respect" in 1996, and there is no denying the BJP's "national appeal" in the state two years later.

But if the BJP and the TMC thought they would be settling the issue between them, it is not so. The emergence of sectarian parties, particularly the Puthiya Tamizhagam dominated by dalits, has upset quite a few calculations.

The TMC and the BJP make no secret of their intention to target the growing constituency of "non-committed" voters, who add up to 40 per cent now and made the difference in the last three elections. The former promises to restore "Kamaraj rule" in the state in 2001. The latter has its sights set on 2006, though it is keeping its plans under wraps.

But the emerging caste-based parties are targeting these same "non-committed" voters. Their victory has been selective, but substantial. For instance, the Pattali Makkal Katchi of the Vanniars, which had been losing elections badly, won four Lok Sabha seats this year in alliance with the BJP-AIADMK.

If the AIADMK's contribution to the PMK's victory was great, the reverse was also true. At the national level, the PMK's four MPs and its consistent pro-BJP stand, even against the AIADMK's wishes, have made a difference. But of greater import has been the revival of the "Vanniar self-respect" call, which, in a way, takes off from the "Tamil self-respect" call, first given by the DMK (in 1967) and later the TMC (in 1996).

If the Puthiya Tamizhagam's presence was missed in the shock of the Coimbatore blasts and the suspense over AIADMK trouble-making, it has been put in focus by the militant attempts at dalit consolidation in recent months. Given the purported anti-AIADMK mood of the dalits in the southern districts after the thevar-dalit riots of 1994, the DMK-TMC combine should have won at least three more Lok Sabha seats despite the Coimbatore blasts, but for the PT taking away a substantial chunk of the voters. In four other constituencies, the party polled a decent percentage of the votes.

Now, it is the PT that is spearheading the dalit movement, in turn motivating some backward class groups to join hands, socially and politically. The dalits have cleverly co-opted the Muslims and most backward classes who are also pitted against the backward classes and forward castes. This has given them additional electoral muscle. This is why the BC groups are targeting the constitutional seat reservations for the scheduled castes, which come up for review in 2001, when elections to the state assembly are also due.

What has given the matter added urgency is the militancy accompanying the dalit consolidation, particularly against the equally militant backward class thevar community in the southern districts. There is also the systematic expansion of the dalit consolidation north from Kodiyamkulam since 1994, triggered by an espousal of local issues and attended by militancy on both sides. Blood unites better than ideology, bloodshed more so.

As if this were not complication enough, attempts are being made to internationalise the issue. Speakers from Tamil Nadu at an international conference on dalits at, of all places, Kuala Lumpur in Malaysia called for taking the case of the Tamil dalits to the United Nations Human Rights Commission. Prominent among these votaries of international pressure was Dr K Krishnaswamy, Puthiya Tamizhagam founder-president.

Senior Janata Dal politician and former Union minister Ram Vilas Paswan was among the Indian delegates at Kuala Lumpur. And the Tamil Nadu representatives included at least one Muslim businessman, a TMC legislator.

Tamil Nadu is likely to host an all-India dalit conference later this year, as a follow-up to Kuala Lumpur. This, it is hoped, will bring the various dalit denominations in the state under one umbrella.

But what may be of greater interest in the national context is the reported promise to try to unite all dalit factions and political organisations, with Tamil Nadu setting the mood.

Already, an attempt is being made to work for dalit consolidation in neighbouring states, and for dalit unity across the states. A meeting of dalit leaders from Karnataka was held in Bangalore recently, attended by some leaders from Tamil Nadu, including Dr Krishnaswamy. A similar review meeting has been held at Madras since the Kuala Lumpur show.

Among the major backward classes seeking consolidation, the thevars seem to be pro-AIADMK. Others seem to be leaning towards the BJP. The Nadars, also in the southern districts, are moving away from the Congress to the BJP. The Kongu Vellalars, or Gounders, in the western Coimbatore belt are moving away from the AIADMK to the BJP. The Vanniars in the north have identified with the PMK. So an electoral combination of these three parties and the Marumalarchi DMK, which has the linguistic minorities on its side, will have a lot of clout.

Any dalit consolidation in these circumstances could favour the DMK, as long as the other side stays united.

But sources in the BJP and the TMC question such a hypothesis. Citing the election results since 1991, they argue against the possibility of anything but an electoral consolidation, based entirely on the administrative failures of the party in power.

There is some truth in this argument. But the electoral consolidations of recent times were crystallised by identifiable issues on poll-eve. That's what swung the non-committed voters one way or the other.

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