Each day (sometimes every hour) brings a fresh twist in the tale that is Tamil Nadu’s politics currently. Now Pannerselvam is CM, now he resigns. Now we are sure Sasikala will be the next CM, now the Supreme Court says Absolutely Not! We even hear rumors of state legislators and MPs being virtually imprisoned in fancy resorts. So what is going on? We try and make sense of the last few days… the plot thickens; gets rather lumpy in fact:
According to reports, it took just 4 minutes for the SC bench, Justices P C Ghose and A Roy to pronounce their verdict. There was a 563 page ‘fatty’ judgement. The unanimous verdict of the judges was to “restore the trial court verdict in toto”, so that the challenge to the order of the lower court, which held Sasikala and other guilty of various charges including corruption, is now vacated. In other words, the lower court’s verdict of ‘Guilty’ is upheld.
In effect TN CM chair hopeful Sasikala is held to be guilty, stands convicted and is looking at four years in jail. She was asked to surrender ‘forthwith’ so her hopes of taking over as the next Chief Minister of Tamil Nadu are pretty much finished.
Referred to unflatteringly as Jayalalithaa's Man Friday; O Panneerselvam has also now staked his claim to the Chief Minister's chair after having tendered his resignation a scant week ago. While a majority of MLAs appear to support the Sasikala camp still, OPS has claimed the support of about one hundred AIADMK legislators. It appears that more may go over to his side.
We are seeing a situation peculiar to Indian politics and one that is seen lamentably frequently: MLAs are transported to a resort usually some distance from town and kept there to be persuaded, offered blandishments and coerced. These MLAs are kept isolated so that the opposite party will not be able to sway and lure them away.
Various celebs including Arvind Swamy, thought of as being one of the sanest celeb voices, commented on the TN situation. “Now, Please ask the MLAs to get back to civilization and start working. There is actually no cause for celebration on both sides. Remember what the trial court judgment is and what it implies. I would like to see our acting CM go to his office today & set an example for all MLAs to commence work. People b4 politics,” he was reported as saying. His "Call your lawmaker" campaign has been lauded as a very positive initiative.
Of course Twitter had a field day. “Fata Paneer, nikla Selvam” said one tweet. “Who moved my cheese paneer” said another and yet another pointed out how Sasikala is probably the first person to join politics and go straight to jail.
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