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Tigers cast a shadow over MDMK's Madras rally

N Sathiya Moorthyin Madras

With reports of a 'pro-Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam' angle appearing on the Marumalarchi DMK front, doubts have arisen over the possibility of Prime Minister A B Vajpayee and Home Minister L K Advani participating in the party's prestigious rally in Madras on September 15.

Indications are that the MDMK leadership is bending over backwards to reassure the security agencies, to ensure participation by the top two BJP leaders.

Real trouble started when Sangoli, the MDMK's mouthpiece, published a long list of slogans which alone should be shouted at the rally to commemorate the 90th birth anniversary of the party's patron-saint, the late C N Annadurai. Though aimed at assuaging the feelings of its AIADMK ally by specifically excluding references to MDMK supremo Vaiko as the 'future chief minister of Tamil Nadu', there were positive references to the LTTE in the list.

Quick to any meddling by the LTTE on the Indian soil, the Intelligence Bureau got into the act. The MDMK leadership too realised the 'oversight', and overnight issued a long list of slogans for the rally, excluding this time, all references to the LTTE. The praise of the BJP leadership continued as before.

MDMK sources blame the AIADMK in private, for the 'IB's interest'. They refer to Janata Party president Dr Subramanian Swamy's 'unprovoked' statement claiming an LTTE presence in the MDMK rally, and his subsequent meeting with AIADMK chief Jayalalitha. They fear that the Jaya-Swamy axis is working overtime to thwart the rally's success, and to break the BJP-MDMK association.

According to MDMK sources, a senior IB official once posted in Madras but now working in a central Indian state capital, was being used to plant stories against the rally, at higher places. "With Vaiko and the party putting so much into the rally, the MDMK cadres will view any absence of Vajpayee and Advani, only as a letdown."

However, IB sources pooh-pooh the MDMK's charge of a possible conspiracy against the rally, and refer to the Sangoli slogans in this regard. ''But for the pro-LTTE slogans mentioned in the MDMK mouthpiece, our curiosity would not have been kindled," they add.

The IB sources also draw a clear distinction between the 'security threat' to the prime minister and the home minister, on the one hand, and the 'diplomatic faux pas' that may result from any pro-LTTE sloganeering at the rally. As they point out, Colombo will not take kindly to such an event, and the mandarins of North Block too would not like to be surprised by MDMK cadres.

Politically, too, it would have been an embarrassment for the prime minister and the BJP leadership. As BJP sources in Madras point out, the Congress and other political parties would have made mince-meat of the BJP on the LTTE issue, and "we would have been left defenceless". In this context, they refer to a rally of the Pattali Makkal Katchi in Madras in early 1992, where pro-LTTE sloganeering cost the party a possible alliance with the Congress.

The MDMK leadership has now warmed up to 'meaningful suggestions', and has accordingly barred all pro-LTTE slogans at the rally. Word has also gone down the line for the cadres not to come dressed in army fatigues carrying toy-guns, or stage the traditional 'tiger dance', where men come dressed like the wild cat. Both are considered representative of the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam.

Though Advani had at one time reportedly thought of dropping out of the MDMK rally, the changed situation has made it mandatory for him to attend, lest his absence should send out a wrong message to Vaiko and company. The home minister was scheduled to attend a function at the National Police Academy, Hyderabad, the same day, and now a Madras trip is being worked into his schedule, it is said.

The AIADMK is organising a separate show of strength at Tiruchi on September 15, and the ruling DMK is having its three-day golden jubilee conference of the party at Tirunelveli then. Jayalalitha has thus decided to stay away from the MDMK rally, and senior AIADMK leader V Sathyamurthy has since come out in the open, on the wisdom of the prime minister participating in it without consulting 'Amma'.

Should they stay away from the Madras rally now, Vajpayee and Advani would have sent out a wrong message to the BJP's MDMK and PMK allies. PMK leader S Ramadoss consented to be present at the MDMK rally after some cajoling by Vaiko, and any Vajpayee-Advani abstention would be seen by the two as the BJP leadership 'using' them against the AIADMK, and then throwing them away.

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