DMK-Cong split enables Jaya to squeeze Left

Late last month, before formation of the Joint Parliamentary Committee (JPC) into the telecom controversy, M Thambidurai, AIADMK leader in the Lok Sabha and party chief J Jayalalithaa’s emmisary, knocked the doors of top CPI(M) leaders seeking support for a berth for his party in the JPC.

He even told the CPI(M) leaders that Amma (as Jayalalithaa is popularly called by her acolytes) ‘will consider your demand for 22 assembly seats (in the Tamil Nadu elections) if unity is retained in Delhi on this issue’. Elections for the 234-seat state assembly are on April 13.

Two weeks later, as the DMK-Congress tussle seems to have turned the tables in her favour, Jayalalithaa has started playing hardball with the Left. Sources said the AIADMK was expected to finalise the seat adjustments today. But it didn’t.

CPI(M) boss Prakash Karat, however, remains confident that Jayalalithaa will not switch over to the Congress at the last moment. “Our talks are going on. I don’t have any indication about that (AIADMK dumping the Left),” he said today after his party’s Central Committee meeting.

While the CPI(M) and the CPI had initially demanded 22 seats each from Jayalalitha, the Left camp now concedes it would be impossible to get anywhere near that number. She has so far offered the CPI just nine seats. CPI(M), according to sources, has already climbed down to 13 seats. Still, Jayalalithaa has not agreed. The CPI’s only demand now is that there should be parity between the two communist parties in allocation.

T Pandian, the Tamil Nadu CPI head, is negotiating with Jayalalithaa. The CPI(M) has fielded politburo member Brinda Karat to talk to Amma.

Privately, a top Left leader admitted Jayalalithaa was now trying to squeeze the Left and give them as few seats as possible. “She knows the DMK-Congress spat will work in her favour. This has made her tougher in the negotiations,” said the communist leader.

But the two Left parties, which have 15 MLAs in the present state assembly, feel it will be difficult for her to altogether dump them and side with the Congress along with the DMDK (to whom she’s already given 40 seats) so late in the day. “During the past five years, she was always a bitter critic of the Congress-DMK alliance. If she joins hands with the Congress, she loses her credibility,” said a Left leader.