Is BJP trying to woo TVK or using it to target DMK over Karur tragedy?

Tamilaga Vettri Kazhagam (TVK) president Vijay (Courtesy: PTI photo)

"Your enemy's enemy is your friend." This seems to be BJP's mantra in Tamil Nadu. While targeting the ruling DMK and trying to put the state government in the dock, the BJP is making use of the fast rising Tamilaga Vetri Kazhagam (TVK) after the Karur tragedy, in which 41 people died. Ignoring the glaring excesses of TVK leader and actor Joseph C. Vijay and his fans that led to the stampede on September 27, the BJP blamed the Tamil Nadu government alone and managed to secure a CBI investigation in the case.

In this, the BJP is accompanied by its ally, AIADMK, which also desists from faulting TVK and squarely places the blame on Tamil Nadu Chief Minister MK Stalin for not ensuring the safety of the participants in the political rally.

The AIADMK, from the beginning, has been seeking an alliance with TVK. The wooing intensified since the tragedy. AIADMK general secretary Edappadi K Palaniswami said that the idea is to unify the opposition together to give the DMK a good fight.

The BJP supports the AIADMK efforts, as it wants the DMK defeated. But it is not sure about wooing TVK and getting it into the NDA fold. So, when the TVK went to the Supreme Court seeking CBI probe into the tragedy, BJP supported the plea, so that the DMK can be bound by legal trouble.

Immediately after the tragedy, Stalin instituted a commission headed by Justice (Retired) Aruna Jagadeesan to look into the events leading to the tragedy. The Madras High Court also set up a special investigation team (SIT) to probe the incident. Following the FIRs, TVK functionaries were arrested but Vijay was spared.

TVK approached the Supreme Court against the formation of the commission and the SIT. A Supreme Court bench comprising Justices JK Maheshwari and NV Anjaria instructed both the commission and the SIT to hand over all papers and documents pertaining to the stampede incident to the CBI. The apex court's decision to transfer the case to CBI is based on the petitioners' plea.

Meanwhile, Vijay has resisted all efforts for an alignment by the AIADMK. Recently at Palaniswami's public meeting TVK flags were waved by a section of the crowd. Though AIADMK claimed they were TVK supporters, functionaries of actor Vijay's party dismissed it. Vijay has set the party’s ideology as that opposed to the BJP. Given this scenario, TVK joining the NDA is unlikely, even though BJP has made all signs of supporting the party in the stampede case.

The BJP agenda seems to be to target the DMK with any weapon at hand: Right now, it is the TVK. The AIADMK strategy seems to be to unite all those opposed to the DMK under its banner, and the TVK is a potential ally. The TVK has positioned itself as a force fighting both BJP and DMK, sparing the AIADMK. But competing ambitions will make an AIADMK-TVK alliance difficult to forge. But the TVK does not mind being helped out of the Karur-related legal issues by the BJP-led Centre. Tactics and strategies seem to work at cross purposes in Tamil Nadu, for the moment.