(Continuing from the previous issue)
While Karunanidhi rated the implementation of the Mandal Commission recommendations as the most important achievement of V.P.Singh, he felt two other crucial policy decisions failed to attract serious attention: the establishment of Prasar Bharti in November 1997 and the withdrawal of the Indian Army from Sri Lanka in 1990. He was convinced that the implementation of the Mandal Commission recommendations delayed the ascendance of the Hindu Right by two decades, and that everyone should be thankful to him for keeping it at bay between 1990 and 2014.
When V.P.Singh wrote to all the chief ministers on 12 June 1990, asking for their suggestions to implement the recommendations of the Mandal Commission, the Tamil Nadu goivernment was the first to make an elaborate presentation. It came up with a clear timeline for implementation, and suggestions to measure the social transformation due to affirmative actions. The recommendations were formally accepted by the Central government on 7 August 1990. In his speech in the Rajya Sabha, V.P.Singh said: ‘This is the realization of the dream of Bharat Ratna Dr B.R.Ambedkar, of the great Periyar Ramasamy, and Dr Ram Manohar Lohia.’
The BJP confronted Mandal with temple politics. Its president, L.K.Advani, sought to travel across the country to mobilize support for the temple. The party was busy projecting Mandal as a divisive plank, and the building of a temple by destroying a 400-year-old mosque, as a unifying initiative, Karunanidhi said, for him, that was the moment when George Orwell’s predictions came true for the second time. In his understanding, Advani’s policy reflected the fears that Orwell spoke of in his dark and dystopic masterpiece, Nineteen Eighty-four: ‘War is peace. Freedom is slavery. Ignorance is strength.’ Wanting to extend his support to V.P.Singh, Karunanidhi invited him to host the National Integration Council (NIC) meeting, for the first time ever, in Madras. At the Madras meeting of the NIC, held on 22 September 1990, it was resolved to urge all parties to wait for the court ruling in the Babri Masjid-Ram Mandir case. Lalu Prasad Yadav, one of the participating chief ministers, told Karunanidhi that he would not permit Advani’s chariot to travel through Bihar. Karunanidhi added: ‘[The] Hindutva forces will keep inventing charges to discredit Lalu and myself as we remain the primary opponents to their hate project.’
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Advani, who started his Yatra from Somnath in Gujarat on 25 September, reached Bihar on 22 October 1990. Advani contacted some of the cabinet colleagues of V.P.Singh and asked them to instruct Lalu Prasad Yadav to permit his journey through Bihar, without any incidents. When Home Minister Mufti Mohammad Sayeed had asked V.P.Singh to let the procession go on, Lalu angrily retorted: ‘You all are intoxicated by power.’ On 23 October, Lalu ordered the arrest of Advani, and the BJP withdrew its support to the National Front government on 24 October. V.P.Singh had to face an internal revolt by a faction led by Chandra Shekhar, who worked out a deal with the Congress to form an alternative government. V.P.Singh resigned on 7 November, Chandra Shekhar, backed by the Congress, became the prime minister on 10 November.
Karunanidhi felt that V.P.Singh’s steadfast commitment to social justice, at the cost of losing his government, deserved popular appreciation. He invited the ex-prime minister for a statewide tour of Tamil Nadu that began in Madras on 8 December and ended in Nagercoil on 12 December. (It is another issue that the overwhelming reception accorded to V.P.Singh became the primary cause for prime minister Chandra Shekhar to dismiss the DMK government within a couple of months.) The cavalcade which left Madras would have six to seven pit stops before culminating in a public meeting in the evening. At major centres like Trichy, Madurai and Tirunelveli, the meeting assumed the character of a state conference. It was also an emotional moment when the veteran Left leader E.M.S.Namboodiripad decided to address some of these meetings.
Namboodiripad said: ‘People are used to having a victory rally when someone comes to power. But, here in Tamil Nadu, there is a rally to celebrate a person, even though he has lost power. This shows the character of not just V.P.Singh but also the courage displayed by Karunanidhi. I am aware of the danger this move could lead to. I have the experience of the dismissal of my government in 1959. In 1969, my government fell because of engineered defections. Hence, I use the word “courage” carefully and consciously.’ Maran was the translator for V.P.Singh at all the venues.
At the state level, Karunanidhi considered his enactment of the equal inheritance right in 1989 as a major achievement. Till then, the property and succession rights of sons and daughters within Hindu families were different. While sons could exercise complete right over their father’s property, daughters enjoyed this right only until they got married. The Self-Respect Conference held in Chingleput in February 1929 had passed a resolution demanding equal rights for women. In 1989, the Hindu succession (Tamil Nadu Amendment) Act, 1989, finally provided equal succession rights. This law has had an understated yet significant impact in addressing gender inequality. At the national level, the law was amended only in 2005, when the DMK joined the Union government as a constituent of the UPA.’
The campaign to oust the DMK began the day Chandra Shekhar came to power. In 1976, the DMK government was dismissed, based on a dossier prepared by the Intelligence Bureau. M.K.Narayanan, the officer-in-charge of Tamil Nadu in 1976, was brought back as the director of the Intelligence Bureau. His appointment made it clear that the Congress was calling the shots. In order to firm up its alliance with the ADMK, the Congress wanted the dismissal of the DMK government. The Intelligence Bureau produced a dossier that said that the DMK was harbouring the LTTE and had failed to curb terrorism in the state. If the 1976 dossier touted corruption, the 1991 dossier touted terrorism. Buit, unlike 1976, the Centre had to deal with a governor who was refusing to sign on the dotted line.
Surjit Singh Barnala came up with a number of counter questions. He pointedly asked the home ministry, for instance how come there were no entries about the DMK’s alleged actions, before the rally for V.P.Singh. He said that he was from Punjab and had seen enough of these games. He declared that he would not be a party to such a treacherous move that undermined the federal balance of the country. When he was transferred to Bihar, following his refusal, he chose to resign from governorship. The governmenmt, headed by Chandra Shekhar, dismissed the Karunanidhi ministry on 30 January 1991, using the ‘otherwise’ provision in Article 356 of the Constitution, after Barnala’s refusal to make a recommendation for dismissal.
(Concluded)
(Source: Kaunanidhi A Life, A.S.Panneerselvam)
