Chennai: Is the DMK the only party that has not distributed cash for votes in RK Nagar? Ground-zero reports say, 'yes'. While the party seniors insist that Thalapathi (Stalin) took the decision not to bribe the voters for the December 21 bypoll so as to garner a clean image for the party and himself as a long-term gain, DMK candidate Marudhu Ganesh seems to be choking in his rivals' 'kindness' flooding the constituency. The journalist-lawyer is hardly a match for the 'heavyweights' with glistening golden swords on the other side of the battle line.
“Thalapathi took a conscientious decision on day-1 itself that we must not give even one rupee for buying a vote. We have implemented that decision in letter and spirit throughout this campaign, which ends Tuesday evening. We are proud of this and we are sure that the voters in RK Nagar will respond in a politically mature manner, and the people of Tamil Nadu will remember our clean record”, said DMK spokesman TKS Elangovan, MP.
His party colleague R.S. Bharathi listed out a couple of other reasons as well to justify the decision to stay away from poll bribes. “We did not strain much when Jayalalithaa contested the seat as we knew it would be tough to win against her political stature and personal charisma. And even when she won, her winning margin was less than 40,000 votes. Now she is not there and her party is splintered”, Bharathi told DC.
“Besides, 45,000 bogus names have been deleted from the voters' list by the Election Commission this time, so it would be easy for us to win”, he added. However, the DMK campaign appears rather weak - except for Stalin's couple of outings - as it lacked the glamour and frills, the song and dance, the caravan of cars and vans, in the rival side.
Nevertheless, the DMK must take credit that in the heavy load of complaints and police FIRs relating to poll violations, the party figured in only a handful and that too in cases that had nothing to do with cash-for-votes. “Of the total 120 FIRs, the DMK has less than 10 and that too cases relating to unlawful assembly and excess use of vehicles”, said a senior police official, requesting anonymity. Another officer said of the 83 vehicles seized for violations in the constituency, “less than five per cent belonged to the DMK”.
Crisscrossing RK Nagar for several days since the bypoll date was declared on November 24, it has been a traumatising experience for the media persons to witness and report the bribing of the voters; worse still is the degradation seen in the public craving for the 'sin' dole. So what if we take the money for our votes, it's only our own money coming back to us, argue the people if an 'outsider' tries to push them on the backfoot with guilt over being bribe-takers. And what's wrong in voting for the highest bidder since one is as bad as the other, anyway, they argue.
While this has been the painful experience of scribes trying to chronicle the campaign, the poll observers have got into a few 'tricky' situations as they were driven away by the residents.
Three of these officers have complained to the Chief Electoral Officer (Rajesh Lakhoni) about the hostile treatment. In an unprecedented move, the EC has now deployed a team of five cops to accompany each of the eight observers. The Commission has also rushed in senior IRS officer Vikram Batra as additional CEO in RK Nagar. He was also the additional CEO here last time when the bypoll was rescinded early April, alleging 'rampant misuse of money power and adopting innovative methods to induce voters'.
