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With assembly polls only a week away, intelligence agencies and the security brass in Tamil Nadu are keeping their fingers crossed.
While there is nothing to suggest any last minute incident, they are not taking chances in the light of pan-Tamil militancy that gained prominence in the light of the Rajakumar abduction episode, which has mostly been forgotten since, what with the vote-inducing Rajiv Gandhi assassination of 1991 and the Coimbatore serial blasts of 1998 leaving them restless, at best.
While nothing concrete seems to have emerged, the agencies are said to be keeping a close watch on Veerappan country, for clues for poll eve incidents that could rock the final tally in what otherwise seems to be a lacklustre election, with no clear issues.
With the Rajakumar abduction episode exposing the impregnable nature of Veerappan terrain, they are also on the look out for pro-Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam elements that may have found the going tough, nearer 'home' in Jaffna, and far away in the United Kingdom, where the organisation has since been outlawed.
Simultaneously, security agencies do not rule out a link-up involving various groups with their own agendas, coming together, for individual purposes. Included in the list could be Islamic fundamentalists, who have been charged with the Coimbatore blasts, and the Naxalites, who have been seeking to stage a comeback in the Dharmapuri belt at the Veerappan foothills.
The agencies are not taking chances. Indications are that DMK Chief Minister M Karunanidhi and AIADMK supremo Jayalalitha stayed away from the high ranges of Udhagamandalam and nearby, if only to ensure that no chances are taken with their security. Reports also speak of a jail inmate informing the authorities about poll-eve incidents that could cause not only confusion, but 'desired poll results'.
Given the high incidence of non-committed voters in the state, sources refer to the Rajiv Gandhi assassination helping to ensure the return of a near-stable government under the Congress at the Centre, in 1991, and a similarly stable dispensation under the Bharatiya Janata Party after the Coimbatore blasts in 1998.
Some even venture to argue that senior Bharatiya Janata Party leader L K Advani may have been spared at Coimbatore, if only to ensure that the BJP-Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh did not sweep the polls. So could have been some Tamil Nadu leaders, if the assassins had chosen any venue other than Sriperumpudur, to target Rajiv Gandhi, earlier.
To a limited extent, the Rajiv Gandhi assassination could induce in the shocked voters, thoughts of the DMK ruler's complacency in tackling LTTE militancy in the wake of the earlier Padmanabha killings, it cost the party dearly in the polls.
Likewise, the Coimbatore blasts recalled for the voter the DMK Government's alleged neglect in handling Islamic fundamentalism, as pronounced by the Coimbatore riots, three months earlier.
At least these sections see ominous signs in the pan-Tamil militancy that the Rajakumar abduction highlighted, signs that could upset the assembly election results.
A saving grace, other sources say, could be the lessening impact of successive shocks of the kind on the neutral voters of Tamil Nadu. If the Rajiv Gandhi assassination ensured that the DMK lost the 1991 polls so very completely, and by huge margins in individual constituencies, the Coimbatore blasts, in comparison, had a different story to tell.
Not only did the losing DMK-Tamil Maanila Congress combine managed to capture 10 seats out of 39, which was also the highest score for the losing party in any Lok Sabha polls in the state, the alliance had also lost many seats by low margins, which could have been the contribution of the blasts.
To them, any incident of the kind would have no great impact on the state voter's at this stage, and that by itself should spare Tamil Nadu of incidents of the kind.
However, they too do not rule out the 'shock value' on the voter, if the target was 'right'. With the result, the agencies are reading between the lines of statements issued by various political parties and leaders, including those perceived as sympathetic to militant groups and causes, apart from analysing electoral alliances to try and understand the anatomy of poll-related political violence in the state.
You may also want to see TN forgets Veerappan in poll campaign
The Complete Coverage: The Abduction of Dr Rajakumar
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