Interestingly poised

The poll process in Tamilnadu is officially set in motion on Thursday (April 13th) with the start of filing nominations. The leaders are ferociously campaigning for their own party candidates as well as for the alliance party candidates, energizing the party cadres with their political speeches and mesmerizing the voters by their poll promises.

Unlike other elections, the role of media in depicting the election fever and exposing the election mood in Tamilnadu looks overdosed. It is astonishing to witness the soaring pre poll surveys though the pollster predictions are successfully biting the dust in Indian electoral space. It is still incredible to understand the sample size and methodology of these surveys in such a populous country.

The Hindu -CNN-IBN Poll conducted by the Centre for the Study of Developing Societies (CSDS) predicts the too close election in the history of Tamilnadu. The margins between the two major alliances are within the margin of error of the survey. The poll was conducted between April 1 and 7 before the DMK alliance started their political campaign and in the week when ADMK has kick started its campaign which obviously gives an edge to the ruling ADMK.

The significance of the poll is substantially weak as 30 % of the voters are in decisive and had not made up their mind. As the poll preciously pointed out, the concentration DMK-PMK combine in Northern pockets of Tamilnadu may fetch more of seats even with less swing in percentage of votes. In spite of the accuracy of this poll, this poll clearly indicates that there is no sweep in Tamilnadu and the election is interesting poised.

The desperation prevailing in both the ADMK and DMK camps is immense to capture the power and it looks bizarre when considering the 1996 and 2001 elections. The unruly scenes and revolt from the party cadres with respect to candidate selection is high and visible across all party lines. The election has so far seen the frequent change of announced candidates which is unusual in Tamilnadu elections.

The dramatic turnaround in the popularity of ADMK and wide acceptance of Ms.J.Jayalaitha after the last parliament election reported by the media does not seems to be tangible at all. Except for the Tsunami relief, the Government has only indulged in the rolling back the stopped welfare schemes and introduces the same old schemes with new names. Even if the Tsunami relief work has to be taken into consideration, it will affect only 15 to 20 constituencies in Tamilnadu.

If the previous elections voting patterns are taken for analysis, the point is very evident that the arithmetic is playing a vital role in deciding the election victory in Tamilnadu than the performance of the existing Governments. The DMK combine is arithmetically well ahead of ADMK alliance. With inclusion of MDMK and DPI, the ADMK is saved from facing the complete wipe out like 2004 election.

As the sufferings from the misrule of ADMK are still afresh in people’s mind, the DPA has the advantage with arithmetic numbers, colourful poll promises and the historical crowd gathering in the tour path of Mr.Karunanithi. With all permutations and combinations and without any last moment surprise, the DMK has an edge over ADMK.