Pranab to meet Jayalalitha?

By Javed M Ansari

NEW DELHI, FEB. 10. A senior Congress emissary, most probably the Congress Working Committee member, Mr. Pranab Mukherjee, is likely to fly to Chennai next week to confer with the AIADMK supremo, Ms. J. Jayalalitha, even as the AICC sources were suggesting today that the party has neither totally closed the ``third front option'' nor yet given up the option of exploring a ``DMK-TMC-Congress minus BJP'' formulation.

The best scenario for the Congress will arise if Ms. Jayalalitha were to understand the party's misgivings over the inclusion of the Pattali Makkal Katchi (PMK) in the ``secular alliance.'' Therefore, one of the main tasks before the Congress emissary when he sits down to talk to Ms Jayalalitha will be to make her appreciate the complexities of the issues involved.

For the Congress, being part of an alliance which includes the PMK goes far beyond electoral considerations. ``It is an extremely sentimental issue for us and we cannot just brush it aside,'' says a senior Congress leader. A view that is shared by the Tamil Maanila Congress (TMC) chief, Mr. G.K. Moopanar, as well.

The AICC leadership may have succeeded in putting a lid on the belligerence of the TNCC leaders, but even they realise the difficulties that lie ahead. For one, the rank and file of the party remains unconvinced of the desirability of any understanding with the PMK.

The Congress has its task cut out as it goes about justifying its relations with a party which has made no bones about its support for the outlawed Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam. Apart from the Congress party's stated opposition to the LTTE, what it cannot easily forget is the manner in which the PMK eulogised the assassins of former Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi. A point that was made rather sharply by the party president, Ms. Sonia Gandhi, to one of the TNCC leaders who attempted to give a clean chit to the PMK.

Both the Congress as well as Mr. Moopanar, in their interactions with Ms. Jayalalitha are expected to demand a greater appreciation of their sensitivities and a greater flexibility in the nature of the alliance. They will demand an arrangement similar to the one in the 1999 Lok Sabha elections, in which the different parties were allied with the AIADMK and not with each other. Both the parties will make it clear that there will be no sharing of seats between them and the PMK and there would also be no common manifesto, with each party contesting on the strength of its own manifesto. The party will also reserve the right to put up candidates against the PMK. The Congress is also likely to make it clear that as far as Pondicherry is concerned, it is not negotiable and will insist on contesting the majority of the seats there.

The pro-Third Front argument is that the Congress will still end up winning more or less the same number of seats that it will be able to manage as part of the Secular Front. The added advantage of the ``Third Front option'' is that the Congress could possibly play the role of a balancing force.

The last, and remote, option is of a DMK-TMC-Congress minus the BJP arrangement. However, it is realised that only Mr. Moopanar can play the role of a catalyst in bringing about this kind of a front.

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