| Published on 26-07-2007 In National |
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Written by
Cho Ramaswamy |
Circumstances beyond his control (read allies anguished over the misbehaviour of ruling party workers) have forced Chief Minister M Karunanidhi to cancel the elections (!) to the cooperatives.
Nobody needs to delude themselves by believing that this decision was triggered by righteous indignation over the atrocities committed by the tertiary DMK leaders during the just concluded electoral exertions.
Had it been otherwise, the euphemism for what passed for elections (better described and decried as vile violence) would have been scrapped even as they began their degeneration and denigration of the people's will.
The acts of filing nominations by themselves were certainly so atrocious.
It was virtually impossible for anybody other than those belonging to the ruling party to file nominations. Rare exceptions to this thumb rule were nipped in the bud.
Normally, these events ought to have outraged all democratically inclined people. As this obviously was not the case, elections (if they can be called that) weren't cancelled at that stage.
There is a caveat to the event as well.
It became apparent that only a chosen few within the DMK could manage to file their papers, thanks to the unleashed violence and "cooperation" of certain sections within the bureaucracy. This resulted in the farce of thousands of "faithful" candidates being declared elected "unopposed" simply because those who wanted to use their democratic right by contesting were prevented with the help of strong-arm tactics.
Nobody thought about nixing this terrible, totalitarian travesty of justice at that stage either.
In the first round, polls were conducted for approximately 6,000 cooperative societies resulting in walkovers for the majority of the "winners."
Electoral allies seethed with rage.
Ranging from snatching of ballot papers by snitches to mounting orgies of brutality – mayhem was the order of the day, "allies" complained bitterly. The government turned a deaf ear to these grave cries alleging foul play and refused to do the decent thing – calling off the perfidy.
Instead, attempts were made by the ruling party to "manage" the situation to make it appear that these mere calumnies by trying out other methods of eyewash. Minister Ko Si Mani announced that re-polls would be held for 25 cooperatives.
As a result, the second stage-managed shows went ahead with booth-capturing, bullying and boorish behaviour played havoc.
PMK founder Dr Ramadoss launched an angry, verbal assault.
The only way out is to boycott this outrageousness, he said.
The irked Marxists warned about serious repercussions within the alliance by pointing out that it was not an alibi accorded to the DMK to carry out a cold-blooded murder of democracy.
The Congress, which had by now adopted the passive attitude of allowing virtually any insulting injustice perpetrated upon them began murmuring with feeble, albeit menacing intent.
Left with no alternative, the CM repealed the (s) elections.
People should not wonder as to why so much is being said about such a minor event.
Those who emerge victorious in cooperative elections have the chance of defrauding the body in myriad means which include allocating loans to their henchmen in return for "commissions," allowing them to become wilful defaulters and finally appealing successfully to the government to write off the resultant non-performing assets.
None of those who head cooperative institutions lose sleep over all this because "forgiving, forgetting and forgoing" have become the lately developed Tamil tradition. After all, one must remember that the government has written off loans worth over Rs.7000 crores.
There are other peculiarly profitable pecuniary prospects as well.
During its earlier tenancy in power, the DMK had procured desiccated coconuts in several areas. This exercise is backed by the central government through financial assistance because there is a policy to save farmers cultivating coconut palms from market speculators.
While that was the policy, the cooperatives did something strange. Instead, they squeezed the last ounce of juice from desiccated coconuts by procuring them from the very speculators they were meant to oppose and sold them at a profit to their own bodies!
During the term of the earlier [AIADMK] government, the minister concerned had accorded permission to pursue 47 relevant cases in this regard. General elections intervened resulting in an interregnum.
And when it was over, the new [and present] government shelved the matter. As a result, those who lived off the fat off the land are leading fancy lives.
In short, cooperative societies have such "fringe' benefits.
Naturally, the DMK has worked tirelessly to "own" them completely. By ensuring the absence of opposition they tried to see to it that they "earned" to the optimum.
Whenever the word "election" occurs during the tenure of the present government, gory grab and graft follow as its appositions.
During the earlier effort to elect representatives to the local bodies, this was the "order" of the day which shocked a judge of the Madras High Court finally leading to the re-polls in 99 out of the 155 wards in Chennai.
In the recent past, the Election Commission felt queasy after hearing tales of bribe and brutality during the by-polls in Madurai. However, the CM managed to bamboozle the body with a "fast one" and thereby got it to play ball with due pressure from the central government.
Now, after la affaire "cooperatives," angry allies have managed to temporarily halt the heavy handedness. Perhaps, the DMK has come to the decision that during elections, everything foul will be considered "fair" because for them it is only a war.
On that count, the AIADMK supremo Jayalalithaa's decision to keep her party out of this fracas has been more than justified.
If the DMK wishes to restore parity and wants the general public to believe that it indeed has faith in democratic conduct of re-polls to the cooperatives in future, it should give ample evidence of really doing so by keeping the desiccated coconut deceivers out of the fray and initiating legal proceedings against them.
That apart, the government also ought to launch a probe to expose the wrongdoers who profited out of the Rs.7000 crore write-offs of cooperative loans and start recovering the defaulted NPAs from its Benamis.
Expecting this to happen is as good as wanting the moon.
For that matter, dark days are here ahead as far as the cooperative movement in the nation is concerned because a woman who abetted in their being filched by her near and dear has just become the President.
Henceforth, honesty is bound to be a casualty.
(Translated from Thuglak by TSV Hari)
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