But with journalists MGR was both inaccessible and vindictive, if crossed. The journalist in me will be propelled in that direction 30 years after I bade goodbye to Chennai. Eventually, the matter went to the Privy Council in London, which in the days of the British Raj was the highest authority to which appeals could be made.Karunanidhi put his finger on the pulse. The things that he felt strongly about he proceeded to take up as themes around which he wove his transformational politics. Students led by Karunanidhi came out in large numbers, and the town reverted to its original name Kallakudi. If the lower court permitted one design, the opposite side would throw a ginger fit. The "manthan”, or the churning, will be within both parties, the DMK and AIADMK. So long as the brahmins were busy with the shape of "namams” on the forehead of the temple elephants, the Dravida movement had nothing to worry about. The interior of his chinese fabric manufacturer house was a series of criss-crossing, cavernous passages until you came to what in racing terms is called the "straight”, a 30-foot dimly-lit narrow hall, at the end of which, like a deity, sat MGR, with his trademark cap and dark glasses.K.Relations between Karunanidhi and M. Alagiri has already given notice of turbulent times ahead. It was a riot of vermillion, ashen and turmeric.It was only proper that he should have found a resting place beside his mentor "Anna”. M. The cadres are in place. The strain on Centre-state relations will be considerable and might reach breaking point as the new players jockey to inherit the Dravida mantle.We have seen the mess in the AIADMK that these two charismatic leaders mindlessly left behind. The DMK, however, has always more real in its politics. But the Thengalai sect would invite the elephant to walk over them unless it was of the Y-design.G. The next line of leadership, (Stalin, for instance) have been in the drill for quite some time. Meeting him, however, was both, a gastronomical treat and psychedelic show.

In the absence of Karunanidhi’s hardnosed pragmatism, however, the second line of leadership may fall back on more radical regionalism, possibly even parochialism, to score points over each other. Suddenly a trolley materialised, which heralded the beginning of elaborate hospitality, an endless procession of delicacies which served a twin purpose — they titillated the palate and discouraged conversation.N. The case zig zagged from one court to the next, but it was not resolved.If both sides were defying court orders, why were they or their office-bearers not sent to jail? As Charles de Gaulle told the French Cabinet as it was considering sedition charges against Jean-Paul Sartre for supporting the freedom fighters in Algeria: "No”, boomed De Gaulle, "you don’t send Voltaire to jail”.I never got to know either well — my inability with Tamil stood in the way. Two year later, the DMK came to power and soon abolished the three-language formula — in the state, Tamil and English would suffice. Jayalalithaa performed the impossible — she amplified charisma, which had already reached the nether regions. First each will churn separately, but eventually the overarching Dravida movement will have to accommodate the cadres and loyalists of both. Playwright Brian Friel had written Translations, a powerful play on a similar situation in Ireland in the 19th century.Karunanidhi’s passing away has brought back disparate images of my five unlikely years in Chennai as regional editor of the Indian Express. Ramaswamy Periyar and C.For Karunanidhi, all of this would be amusing.Tamil Nadu is in for interesting times. The way Karunanidhi burst upon the political scene in 1953 required political imagination. Stalin was always going to be a pipedream. How can anyone complain against the UP police for showering rose petals on the rioting kawarias.Karunanidhi, an atheist like his gurus, E. The sight stoked my curiosity, but it did not repel me.This agitation set the scene for the much bigger agitation in 1965 against the imposition of Hindi.

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