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Constituency Profile/Sivaganga

Chidambaram working on the numbers

"He will win hands down, and we are only working towards improving his victory margin." It does not happen all the time, but it has been happening in his case, at least. Contesting successively from his native Sivaganga constituency, Union Finance Minister Palaniappan Chidambaram has been improving upon his victory margins, election after election. And his camp follower, Murugappan, is hopeful of Chidambaram "improving upon himself." (sic)

But it's not going to be all that easy for the Tamil Maanila Congress candidate. Though no one seriously disputes Chidambaram's winning chances this time too, they are not writing off his electoral adversary either, All-India Anna Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam Deputy General Secretary K Kalimuthu. In him, AIADMK supremo Jayalalitha has chosen one of her two best candidates. The other is film star Ramarajan, who is contesting against another Union minister, Dhanushkodi Adithan, also of the TMC, at Tiruchendur.

Chidambaram comes from the traditionally aristocratic and business-oriented Nattukottai Chettiar community, who hail from the region but have travelled across the seas over the years. Against this, Kalimuthu is a Mukkulatthoar, who are numerically stronger in Sivaganga, but a non-native. He belongs to Madurai, located an hour's drive away. Kalimuthu had won the Sivakasi Lok Sabha seat once and was a minister in M G Ramachandran's government. There is also a Congress nominee, M Gowrishankar, who had lost to Chidambaram in 1996, but he is hardly considered a serious contender.

The strength of both candidates are their organisational and oratorical skills. Though you cannot describe Chidambaram a great orator in the true Dravidian mould, like Kalimuthu, he does have a way with words. Like his political mentor, the late Rajiv Gandhi, Chidambaram speaks in measured tones and in a cultured voice that reaches out to the heart, and sounds sincere, honest, and serious.

In contrast, Kalimuthu is a political platform speaker of some repute, who can collect a crowd of his own if only to hear him out. He is loud and clear, and passes muster even with the lower middle class audience with his extensive quotations from ancient Tamil literature. For a party that had its grassroots in the oratory skills of the DMK founders, this means a lot, particularly in terms of attracting the voters and mesmerising the cadres.

"He is like the crotons in a rich man's garden, but I am like the greens growing in your kitchen backyard,'' Kalimuthu tells his rural voters, referring to his adversary. Kalimuthu does not want to discuss national or state-level politics, but asks: "What has Chidambaram done for his constituency, either as a four-term member or as a senior minister at the Centre?" In particular, he refers to the graphite factory that Chidambaram had promised long ago but done little about.

The graphite factory issue is the Achilles's heel in Chidambaram's otherwise impressive record. The last time round, he blamed the Jayalalitha-led AIADMK state government for sanctioning the project to deny him any credit.

"The papers are at various stages of processing with the present DMK government, and should be cleared any time," says a Chidambaram aide.

Chidambaram also cannot justify taking the support of the DMK after having criticising the state government on different counts over the past months. His saving grace, however, is that his other adversaries, including Shanthi Udaiyappay of the Dalit-backed Puthiya Thamizhgam, have not raked up the topic much.

Chidambaram won the 1984 election by 213,000 votes, which went up by a marginal 7,000 votes five years later, and by another 9,000 votes in 1991, all as a Congress candidate. In 1996, he bagged 418,774 votes against Gowrishankar's 171,000. An Independent, A Aruldoss, polled 91,000 votes. The candidates of the MDMK and the BJP, now allied with the AIADMK, garnered 41,164 and 6,739 votes respectively.

Says AIADMK member Ramicken, "Barring 1989, when there was 'no wave' of any kind, Chidambaram has always won his seat riding on the crest of one wave or the other. That will not happen this time." However, Ramicken hesitates in declaring Kalimuthu the winner.

Chidambaram's supporters point out that he has nurtured his constituency well. Despite being a senior Union minister, he has always found time to spend with his electorate, and has kept himself accessible to the people.

Moreover, he seems have to taken no major political decision in his career without "consulting" his constituents, be it the formation of the Tamil Maanila Congress or the founding of the United Front. Chidambaram also always found time to rush to his constituency at the height of the crises that befell the H D Deve Gowda and I K Gujral governments and kept his voters informed about what was happening in distant Delhi, through public meetings and private discussions.

With Tamil Nadu Chief Minister and DMK supremo M Karunanidhi addressing a well-attended election meeting here, whatever little heartburn was there between the two party cadres have been cleared. "This is a source of immense strength to us, and so is the active involvement of the Rajnikanth fans," says Balakrishnan, a DMK office-bearer at the panchayat- level in the constituency. As he points out, Chidambaram is among the few DMK-TMC leaders who kept the Rajnikanth fans on his side after the last poll.

Against this, the AIADMK are looking up to Jayalalitha to inject an additional dose of morale to their campaign. "The only risk," concedes Selvaguru of the MDMK, now working for the AIADMK, "is that she is capable of launching a tirade against Chidambaram like she did the last time. This may not go well with the locals who are proud of a 'son of the soil' going up the political ladder at the national level."

That, everyone agrees, will decide the victory margin, if not the victor himself.

RELATED FEATURES:
Campaign Trail: Chidambaram is a man driven
Interview: 'Politics in the country has broken up statewise'

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