Days after its humiliating defeat in the RK Nagar bye-elections, DMK patriarch M Karunanidhi’s son and expelled leader MK Alagiri launched a scathing attack on his younger brother and Leader of the Opposition, MK Stalin. Speaking on the embarrassing loss suffered by the DMK in the recently concluded bye-election, Alagiri in an interview to Puthiya Thalaimurai said, “As long as MK Stalin is Working President of the party, the DMK will not win any elections.”
When asked about the defeat of the DMK in RK Nagar, he said, “No party will accept defeat. They will give some lame excuses. After losing, they will say democracy has lost. (DMK leader) Durai Murugan said the party’s vote has been eaten by money. How insulting it is to the hardworking party cadres to call them sell-outs! They have worked to build the party and elevate the party to power since Anna’s time and Kalaignar’s time. That is wrong. How will the party stand in the future? True party cadre will feel exactly what I am feeling.”
The former Union Minister, however, refused to discuss the long-standing rivalry between himself and his brother Stalin, saying, “Don’t ask me what happened four years ago. I asked questions on behalf of the party cadre and I was thrown out. There is no respect for justice. My son has also put on Twitter that betrayal will never win.”
When asked for his solutions to the problems that ail the DMK, he said, “There needs to be a change. It’s not enough if one person says ‘thambi va, thalaimai thaanga va’ (come younger brother, come to lead us). There needs to be talent and hard work. It’s not enough to get on the stage or stand in a van and ask for votes. There should be field work. Kalaignar used to work hard. Lot of people from the districts are working and there has to be someone to supervise all the work.”
When Stalin took over as DMK Working President in January, Durai Murugan had invoked words said to him by CN Annadurai and said to Stalin, thambi va, thalaimai thaanga va.
Rejecting the DMK’s claim that the party had lost because they did not distribute money, Alagiri shot back saying, “Does that mean they have won all along because of money? Isn’t that what it seems like they are saying? People can spend only spend how much the Election Commission allocates for spending.”
Incidentally, Alagiri is credited with the now infamous “Thirumangalam formula”, where it was widely alleged that the DMK had won the 2009 bye-election after distributing cash to voters.
Dismissing the “formula” altogether, the expelled leader said, “After every election they blame it on the Thirumangalam formula, they put the blame on cash for votes, but that is not the case. You don’t know how hard the party cadres worked for the elections. You have not seen it on the ground. Only if the headmaster is active, the teachers will work. As long as party posts are being given to those who abandoned the party and betrayed the party and the old timers of the party are forgotten, nothing will change.”
Alagiri added that TTV Dhinakaran’s victory was ensured by his field work. “He has done fieldwork. That’s why he won. He has got a new symbol at number 33(on the EVM). Two leaves and the rising sun are famous symbols. If people vote for a new symbol, it means that they are fed up with the two options- AIADMK and DMK. That’s why TTV Dhinakaran won,” he said.
Alagiri was expelled from the DMK in March 2014 following anti-party activity.