STALWARTS GIVE 15th LOK SABHA A MISS

The 15th Lok Sabha will miss some of the well known stalwarts. The list includes former Prime Ministers Atal Bihari Vajpayee,  Chandra Shekar and V P Singh would not be seen in the polls. Mr. Vajpayee is not contesting due to ill health while the other two are dead. The next Lok Sabha would also miss veteran parliamentarian Somnath Chatterjee who refused to contest polls after he was expelled from his party CPI(M) following his refusal to quit the office of the Speaker during the no confidence motion against the government.

 

                        Mr. Chatterjee and Mr.Vajpayee are ten-term veterans of the people’s house. Mr. Vajpaypee has not lost even a single Lok Sabha election that he contested. Mr. Chatterjee has won all but one. He lost once to Ms. Mamatha Banerjee in the Jadavpur constituency in 1984.  Missing along with them would be A BA Ghani Khan Choudary of the INC. Mr. Choudary is an eight-term veteran like Mr. Chandra Shekar. This Lok Sabha is also likely to miss Mr.George Fernandes. Mr. Fernandes might contest the polls despite being in ill health. He was denied a ticket by his party following this poor health. However it is widely reported that the denial of ticket was due to his failed relations with some of this party colleagues namely Sharad Yadav and Nithish Kumar. Further even if Mr. Fernandes contests polls he is not expected to win.

Another notable veteran to give the Lok Sabha a miss would be Mr. P M Sayeed. Many might not remember him. He is an eight time MP from Lakshwadeep. Although he lost the last election there, he was elected to the Rajya Sabha and was made the Power Minister in the UPA government, a post that he held until his death in Soeul in 2005. P M Sayeed was also the Deputy Speaker in the 13th Lok Sabha. Other veterans to miss the bus would be Janatha Dal President  and former Chief Minister of Karnataka Mr. Bommai and former Delhi Chief Minister Mr. Sahib Singh Verma. Both are dead. Mr. Verma is well known as the only loyal supporter of Mr. Advani during the Jinnah episode. 

FAMILY FIRST POLICY NEXT

Today I would like to bring to fore the politics of the Thackeray clan. The Shiv Sena and the Maharashtra Navnirman Sena (MNS) have largely banked on the Maharastrian pride to win votes. That is well known. Today we will see another side of the Thackerays, the love for their respective families. It is well known fact that Mr. Raj Thackeray left the parent party Shiv Sena because his uncle wanted his son Uddhav to take over the reins from him. Several leaders have left the Sena citing the extra space given to the junior Uddhav Thackeray. But is Mr. Raj any different from his uncle?

 

            It is a well-known story that the Thackerays do not contest elections, because the Sena chief Bal Thackeray had declared that he does not believe in democracy. However, one Thackeray has broken the ranks. Shalini Thackeray will contest the Lok Sabha election from Mumbai northwest that includes many Maharashtrian-dominated localities. Shalini, 40, MBA, is Jitendra Thackeray’s wife. Jitendra is cousin to both Raj and Uddhav. Shalini is contesting on Raj’s Maharashtra Navnirman Sena (MNS) ticket.

 

          But here lies the crunch -- Shalini is a north Indian -- a Punjabi by birth -- a section of Indians that Raj has railed against for the better part of the last two years. Shalini Talwar, now Thackeray, says she is a Maharashtrian by marriage, has lived in Mumbai for the last two decades, speaks Marathi fluently and believes in Raj’s anti-north Indian ideology that she asserts has been misinterpreted across the country. Raj says Shalini is his best candidate for Lok Sabha. If Shalini meets Raj’s criteria for being a Maharashtrian, Congress leaders from UP and Bihar, like Mumbai unit chief Kripa Shankar Singh and spokesperson Sanjay Nirupam, wonder why they don’t fulfil the criteria. So do millions of others in Mumbai. Answer that, Raj.

 

Of course the Thackerays are not the exception. In Tamil Nadu the Pattali Makkal Katchi(PMK) and the Dravida Munnetra Kalagam(DMK) are a case in point. I remember the PMK founder Mr.Ramadoss thundering when his party was launched that none of his family members would accept a party or government position. But the first thing he did was to get his son the Health Minster Cabinet post as soon as they joined the UPA. 

ASTROLOGY IN POLITICS

Politicians and Sooth-Sayers have always shared a cozy relationship. Some of the politicians who are known to follow the advice of astrologers assiduously include Jayalalitha, Deva Gowda, and many top leaders in the BJP and INC. The latest from Jayalalitha is that her astrologer wants her to contest 23 seats in Tamil Nadu, the result of which might just lead to the breaking of her new found multi party alliance. Amma’s brush with astrologers is not new. She was asked to keep the name J Jayalalitha. Since people referred to her as Jayalalitha, her astrologers asked her to change her name to Jayalalithaa ( note the extra ‘a’). In Numerology ‘a’ and ‘j’ have the same value of 1 and hence the change.

                          Amma has already given 7 seats to the PMK ( a Vanniyar caste based party), 3 seats each to the CPI and CPM thus leaving the total number of available seats to 26 (39-7-3-3). If she has to contest 23 seats then she has only 3 seats left for the MDMK. It should be noted that MDMK already has 4 Lok Sabha MP’s. The MDMK general secretary Mr.Vaiko had asked for 5 seats from Amma but now has only 3 on offer. Of the 3 seats, one is Central Madras and the other is Madurai both of which are the stronghold of the DMK. Mr.Dayanadhi Maran will be contesting in Central Madras and Mr.Alagiri (son of M.Karunanidhi) will be contesting in Madurai, so there is no way of winning these two seats.

 

           It is now being contemplated that Mr.Vaiko could join hands with the DMDK ( popular Tamil actor Vijaykanth’s party) or the BJP. However in either case there is no doubt that the MDMK will draw a complete blank in the Lok sabha polls.Now coming back to the Amma, she now wants every prospective MP seat seeking party men to meet her with their horoscopes. The interview process is apparently three fold. In the first round the seat seeker’s spending prowess is analyzed, in the second round the person’s popularity in  the constituency is analysed. Now after this is a personal one on one meeting with Amma. Now the person is required to meet Amma with his/her horoscope. This horoscope will be analyzed by Amma’s personal astrologer, to decide on the winnability of the candidate.

 

            Seems Amma is hell-bent on restoring her ego as a serious player in Tamil Nadu politics after being routed in the 2004 General elections and the 2006 Assembly elections. But can the other camp (the DMK) pride themselves to be rationalists? It is a well known fact that M.Karunanidhi wears a Yellow shawl and a gem stone ring on requests from his family members after advice with an astrologer. So all’s fair in love, war and politics!