Chennai: Raking the past to score brownie points against the DMK, Union Home Minister and senior BJP leader Amit Shah appears to have got his facts wrong. But, his assertion that the BJP will ensure that a Tamil becomes a Prime Minister of the country has amused the political class.
First, he blamed the DMK for scuttling the chances of two Tamils – Congress Stalwart and former Chief Minister K Kamaraj and Congress veteran GK Moopanar – from occupying the PM's gaddi. Sounding the poll bugle while addressing party functionaries at Kovilambakkam on the city outskirts on Sunday, he said, “The party should set a target of winning 25 Lok Sabha seats so that many of those elected get elevated as Union Ministers. And ultimately, we will strive to make a Tamil the Prime Minister.”
Countering Shah's charge about the DMK blocking Kamaraj's opportunity to become the PM, many have pointed out on social media that the towering Congress leader had lost to the Dravidian party in the 1967 Assembly poll from Virudhunagar. But, in the subsequent 1971 parliamentary elections, held after the split in the Congress, the Congress (O) of which Kamaraj was a pillar, had won only 16 constituencies nationally.
And he had passed away well before the 1977 Lok Sabha elections which saw the rout of the Congress (I), led by Indira Gandhi. This being the case, there is no possibility of either Kamaraj becoming the PM or the DMK having any role in scuttling his chances, which is far-fetched.
Next comes the story of GK Moopanar. This has been made clear by none other than late President Pranab Mukherjee who, after unveiling a life-size statue of Moopanar at Kumbakonam on July 4, 2010, recalled the events when the United Front government was formed after the 1996 general elections.
“It was decided to make Moopanar, who was heading the Tamil Maanila Congress (TMC) then, as the consensus candidate as PM. The Congress has lent outside support. And I carried the message to him. He firmly refused it, asking not to compel him since he wanted to be with the people. He was one who was not after power,” Pranab Mukherjee had said as reported in a Tamil daily.
However, when HD Deve Goda became the Prime Minister of the United Front government, rumour mills were awash that it was the DMK that had worked against a fellow Tamil. And it continued to surface every now and then. But, even after TMC merged with Congress and the DMK teamed up with the BJP, Karunanidhi and Moopanar shared a very good relationship.
TNCC president KS Alagiri, a camp follower of Moopanar an MLA of the TMC at that time, came to the defence of the DMK and said, “Amit Shah is wrong. Moopnar never hankered after power. He had turned down the proposal to consider him as the PM. He had clearly told this to the late Murasoli Maran who called on him on the instructions of the late DMK patriarch M Karunanidhi,” he told the media in Chidambaram.
Going a step further, Chief Minister and ruling DMK president MK Stalin wondered 'whether Shah was nursing a grudge against Modi that has made him say this'. Speaking to reporters at Mettur in Salem district after opening the shutters of the Stanley Reservoir for the delta region, he said “I welcome this. Certainly, I am happy that a Tamil is being fielded as the PM candidate. I expect that Tamilisai Soundararajan, Governor of Telangana, and Union Minister L Murugan would get such an opportunity.” On the DMK blocking the chances of Kamaraj and Moopanar, his asked the Union Home Minister to come out with facts.
DMK leader Kanimozhi, MP, joining issue with Shah, asked him to prove their credentials of the love for Tamil by first making it the Official Language of the Indian Union and the language of the Madras High Court. In a Twitter post, she questioned the BJP's commitment to promoting Tamil and asked the saffron party to practice what it says. DMK Parliamentary party leader and former Union Minister TR Baalu said what the BJP-led Union government had given to the Tamils was Hindi imposition, dismantling reservation of OBCs, and denial of funds for the state among others.
Also read: In Chennai, Amit Shah pitches for a Tamil PM in future, talks about power outage at airport
