Will face of DMK change with new chief’s style?

CHENNAI :  When Stalin takes charge as the DMK president on Tuesday, the party will see a president much different from his father and party patriarch M Karunanidhi. Consider this: Four district secretaries of the party and around 50 other heads of lower level units were sacked in recent months when Stalin was the working president. This is in sharp contrast to Karunanidhi’s style of working. 

Party insiders say Karunanidhi had sacked only two district secretaries in his career as the party’s president for over five decades, except when splinter groups were formed.Political observers said Stalin’s style of handling the party functionaries resembled that of the rival AIADMK’s late leader, J Jayalalithaa. For example, in a striking similarity, the sacking of party functionaries was announced through the party’s mouthpiece Murasoli, just like such announcements published in the AIADMK’s ‘Namadhu MGR’. 

Even when Karunanidhi sacked his functionaries, it was done only after an internal enquiry into the complaints and there were never the circumstances in which the party functionaries would come to know about their dismissal only through the party newspaper.A senior leader of the party, on condition of anonymity, said, “Whenever there are some problem with a functionary, Karunanidhi would try to pacify the cadre. He would dismiss someone only as the last resort and only after the allegations are proved. In most cases, he would merely suspend the person and reinstate him later.”

When the Erode district secretary NKKP Raja was dismissed by Karunanidhi, it was only after the allegations against him were proved after an enquiry.On the contrary, “Stalin reshuffled the functionaries of 13 district units of the party in June without sending showcase notice to them,” said a long-time member of the party.However, a few in the party opined that Stalin cannot take such an authoritarian approach immediately. “He can gain the confidence of the cadre and functionaries only if he takes them along with him. So, he will run the party smoothly especially since he has to check the influence of his elder brother Alagiri,” said a party functionary.

Political analyst Raveenthran Duraisamy said, “Stalin seems to follow Jayalalithaa’s formula (in running the party). He wants to have just a single leadership in the party and that’s why he is not allowing his brother Alagiri’s entry into the party.”The next few months will be a litmus test not only for Stalin but also for the second-rung leaders too since they have to adjust to Stalin’s working style.