Was it lack of nerves that kept Jayalalitha out of the Pudukottai campaign?

N Sathiya Moorthy in Madras

Doctors say Jayalalitha Jayaram has sciatica, but the man on the street, particularly her AIADMK cadres, are sceptical, if not downright rude. They attribute her health problems not to stretched nerves, but to lack of nerves in facing the Pudukottai voters, who are voting in an assembly by-election on Saturday, February 8.

That Jayalalitha has been suffering from a series of physical ailments is known for sure. She is known to have been suffering from arthritis and spondilitis, both nerve-related problems, apart from thyroid deficiency. Given the secrecy that has gone into her health condition from the days she entered politics under the late M G Ramachandran, all kinds of rumours had come to be spread.

Though the general mood is one of sympathy for the ailing leader who was admitted to the Apollo Hospital on Sunday -- where she has been advised rest -- it's the timing that has upset her cadres. The AIADMK is expected to fair badly at Pudukottai, and none expected Jayalalitha to campaign for the party.

Senior party leaders found excuses for the party not to contest the by-election, promising instead, all material help.

What has added to Jayalalitha's woes is her cancelling encounters with the cadres from the districts soon after the poll debacle last year. An elaborate programme was chalked out for the purpose and disillusioned-yet-loyal cadres came from the districts in large numbers on the first two days. What she heard at the closed-door exchanges and outside the her Poes Garden home upset Jayalalitha so much that she took ill. The programme was postponed, never to be revived.

"We would not have been demoralised had she not planned the Pudukottai trip in the first place," says one AIADMK leader. But unlike many others, he is convinced that she meant to visit Pudukottai and is not faking an illness. "She knows from the MGR example how important it is for her to be in good health if she wants to fight back in politics. MGR's robust health used to be part of any discussion at village tea-shops," he says.

One party insider told this correspondent that she is not faking ill-health. "She has made it amply clear in the past nine months that she is here to stay and fight back. She doesn't want to yield, and there is no question of her fighting shy of meeting the masses. If it is not today, it has to be some day, and you cannot wish it away. And more than anyone else, Jayalalitha knows it better."

The AIADMK seems to have lost the Pudukottai battle even before it had begun. None expected the party to win the seat -- which the ruling DMK won by a 42,000 vote margin last year -- in the company of the Tamil Maanila Congress. The TMC is still with the DMK, and both party leaders, namely M Karunanidhi and G K Moopanar, have been campaigning together for the ruling party candidate.

Even if the AIADMK candidate had won a couple of thousand votes more than last year, observers say that would have been a morale-booster for the party.

"Now we are in danger of being pushed to third place," says the AIADMK leader, quoted earlier. ''Voters in the state expect party leaders to come to them, seeking their votes, and Jayalalitha's absence will be construed as her fear of the people. Against this, Marumalarchi Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam leader V Gopalswamy has been in the field from day one. It would have been a different story if Jayalalitha had not announced her campaign plans in the first place, saying she had court cases to prepare for."