Jaya slogs on her 'rest day' to safeguard fort Chennai

CHENNAI: After kicking up dust in the hinterlands, when J Jayalalithaa's poll wagon stormed the city streets on Wednesday, the message was clear to her friends and foes: Chennai seats can make the difference between trouble and triumph.
In J Jayalalithaa's original campaign schedule, Wednesday was mentioned as a rest day. But it turned out to be one of her most rigorous campaign days.The CM crisscrossed the city , touching 42 `points' and making 16 pit-stops. Her speech had nothing new, just a fervent appeal to let peace prevail.
For her regime to prevail, too, Chennai is crucial. After all it was a DMK bastion that she breached in style in 2006, though she could not come to power then. In 2006, the AIADMK won seven city seats -Royapu ram, R K Nagar, Park Town, T Na gar, Triplicane, Mylapore and Saidapet. This was quite an achieve ment given that even in 2001, when she captured pow er, her party got only two seats Royapuram and ar -in the capital RK Nagar -in the capital (Her allies Tamil Manila Congress and CPM won a seat each). Even in the elections of 1977, 1980 and 1984 when MGR stayed put at Fort St George, the DMK retained a majority of the Chennai seats. After achieving in 2006 something even her mentor MGR could not do, Jayalalithaa bettered her tally in Chennai in 2011, winning in 10 of the 16 city constituencies.
So, does Jayalalithaa see a threat in Chennai this time? “It looks like,“ said an AIADMK insider. “We started on a strong note, but as the campaign progressed, the DMK appeared to have gained some strength in urban constituencies. Amma wants to nullify that.“
With freebies and welfare not promising enough for parties to gain urban votes, leaders are expected to make a different pitch in the capital city during the grand finale of the campaign that ends on Saturday .
Not to allow Jayalalithaa to do much harm in his erstwhile citadel, DMK leader M K Stalin will return to campaign in Chennai on Friday .