All too often, opponents accuse the Congress in Tamil Nadu of harbouring more leaders than workers. Given this image, it is no wonder that the party in the State has faced more dissent and splits than it has in most other regions in India.
And, 2016 presents an acid test to the Congress’s breakaway regional party, the Tamil Maanila Congress (TMC), which is contesting the election in alliance with the Peoples’ Welfare Front and the Desiya Murpokku Dravida Kazhagam.
The Congress, perhaps, witnessed its greatest crisis nationally in 1969. After Indira Gandhi was expelled from the party, she took away a majority of the All India Congress Committee members and formed the Congress(I). The faction led by the iconic K. Kamaraj became the Congress(O).
In Tamil Nadu in 1971, the two factions clashed from opposing fronts. While Mr. Kamaraj chose to align with the Swatantra Party of C. Rajagopalachari, Ms. Gandhi held hands with the DMK. In fact, her party decided to contest only the Lok Sabha polls and left the Assembly election entirely to the DMK, much to the dissatisfaction of C. Subramaniam. The DMK though swept the State and decimated Kamaraj’s party.
After the death of Mr. Kamaraj in 1975, many in the Congress(O), led by G.K. Moopanar, jumped ship. The task of keeping the Congress(O) alive was left to senior leader P. Ramachandran. However, he could not sustain long despite staking claim to the legacy of Mr. Kamaraj (he even used Mr. Kamaraj’s car) and later merged the outfit with the Janata Party in 1977.
Regionalism“Leaders who walk out of the Congress have never tasted lasting success because Congress workers do not subscribe to regionalism. Their outlook is always national,” says senior leader A. Gopanna, adding that Mr. Ramachandran joined Indira Gandhi’s party after the fall of the Janata government in 1979.
There were some famous walkouts from the Tamil Nadu Congress in the 1980s. In 1988, popular actor Sivaji Ganesan, then a Rajya Sabha member, resigned over differences in the way the high command dealt with the government led by Janaki Ramachandran, the widow of M.G. Ramachandran.
By then, the AIADMK had split, with Jayalalithaa leading the rebel group. Sivaji floated the Tamizhaga Munnetra Munnani and fought the 1989 elections with Janaki, only to face a humiliating defeat. He never recovered from the blow and slowly faded away from the political scene. The decade also saw leaders like Kumari Ananthan and P. Nedumaran launching their own parties without much success.
It was in 1996 that the Congress saw its strongest rebellion in the State. Infuriated by the decision of P.V. Narasimha Rao to continue the alliance with the AIADMK, Mr. Moopanar launched the TMC. Unlike the attempts in the 1980s, this was a truly debilitating split for the party, sidelining the original Congress for a good six years.
But following Mr. Moopanar’s death, his son G.K. Vasan united with the parent party in 2002 only to walk out again in 2014.
Difficult for TMCIn the current avatar, the TMC has found it tough to mark its presence.
While the idea was to replace the Congress in the alliance equation as in 1996, Mr. Vasan was not preferred by the Dravidian parties. Senior leaders like Peter Alphonse have now moved back to the Congress, indicating that the TMC does not have a conducive political atmosphere as in 1996 to make a major impact.
The support base of the TMC is also limited to the five districts around the Cauvery delta regions in Tamil Nadu where it seeks to evoke the legacy of Mr. Moopanar who belonged to a community of landlords.
But what leads to such frequent churning in the Tamil Nadu Congress Committee? “The high command never allows the emergence of a strong leader here. They take decisions inimical to the health of the party in Tamil Nadu. This is one of the major reasons for the splits. You will know the impact of the TMC when the Assembly election results come out,” says B.S. Ganadesikan, former TNCC president who is currently the TMC vice-president.
