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Inbathamizhagan may
take on father in TN

Like father, like son, after Thamaraikkani, it is his son Inbathamizhagan who is making news.

If the father, recently sacked from the parent AIADMK for another time offered to join any party willing to field him from his Srivilliputtur bastion in the assembly elections, the son is in the news for similar reasons.

But the father, who started it off, ended with mud on his face this time.

If Thamaraikkani issued a statement and preceded it with a formal complaint at the MLAs' hostel police station in Madras, that his son had been kidnapped, it did not take the latter much time to come out with one on his own.

The son claimed that he was whatever he was doing was on his own free will.

In the eye of the law, that is enough, as he is grown up enough to be a sitting member of the Srivilliputtur town municipal council, and is seeking to contest his father's assembly seat on an AIADMK ticket.

While Thamaraikkani was expelled from the party, his son has not followed his father, as during the 1999 parliamentary polls.

Having failed to get an AIADMK nomination for his son, Thamaraikkani contested the Sivakasi Lok Sabha seat, particularly sore with AIADMK General Secretary Jayalalitha, for insulting him on the wayside, for poor campaign arrangements in the locality.

That was one of the few times he lost the polls, but his presence contributed to the defeat of the official nominee and controversial former Supreme Court judge, V Ramaswamy.

Thamaraikkani once again joined issue with his son, claiming through another statement that the latter had, after all, been kidnapped.

He also named some AIADMK leaders.

Otherwise, he seems to have given up hope on the prodigal son, who has publicly urged Jayalalitha to allot him his father's Srivilliputtur assembly seat.

If it came to that, he was willing to take on his father, he said.

However, with all political parties careful not to field turn-coats in the assembly polls, fearing a hung assembly, where horse-trading may be rampant, there are little chances of Thamaraikkani getting a party ticket from any other at this late hour. Unless he manages to 'punch' his way through them all, what with his mega-size finger rings, clearing the way for him, as they have done while 'patting rival legislators in a friendly manner' in the state assembly.

His camp is debating the wisdom of his contesting the polls as an independent all over again, given repeated antics of their leader, which has not exactly gone down with local voters. However, there is no denying his antics even when Thamaraikkani won the 1991 and 1996 polls against the prevailing poll waves of the times and against the official AIADMK nominee, as an independent, displaying the loyalty of his constituents.

Incidentally, this is not the first time Thamaraikkani's sons are in the news. Nor is the first time he has filed a police complaint about a missing son.

This time last year, the Madras media scene was aghast with reports of Thamaraikkani's police complaint about his school-going son missing for two days. Even as the Madras police got into the act, their counterparts from near native Srivilliputtur solved the mystery of the missing son.

Accordingly, the boy, student of a Madras school, had been caught breaking open a local centre where the +2 examination papers had been stored for central valuation, with a couple of his classmates and friends. They had hired a taxi from Madras, parked it a little away from the school campus, jumped the fence, and were breaking open the locks, when the sentry got wind.

That was two days before the father went to the Madras police, as he became alive to the situation, and pushed the panic button.

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