Month to go for TN election, parties shuffle, reshuffle

Chennai: This day next month you may know who will govern Tamil Nadu for the next five years. For now, however, the guessing game remains tough as much for the parties as for the voters.
With only 10 days to go before the last day of filing nomination, a sense of uncertainty pervades war rooms of all major political parties that keep changing candidates in at least a few constituencies every day.
While Sasikalaa's recommendations and intelligence reports on the prospects of candidates force AIADMK leader J Jayalalithaa to change her hand, open rebellion in several districts make DMK prince Stalin shuffle his pack. The Congress, meanwhile, is grappling with the wish lists of rival factions. P Chidambaram's whine that the DMK had dumped "unwanted seats" on the Congress has not helped matters.
On the field, though, Jayalalithaa and Stalin are kicking up dust and throwing mud at each other. Just when you thought that her campaign speeches were getting repetitive, Jayalalithaa on Monday sprang a surprise, referring to the ethnic strife in Sri Lanka. "Karunanidhi was responsible for the deaths of Tamils in Lanka," she told an election rally in Kancheepuram. She did not elaborate.
In the other temple town of Trichy, DMK leader M K Stalin sought to defuse internal squabbles by calling Thiruverumbur DMK candidate Mahesh Poyyamozhi his "son" before lashing out at Jayalalithaa for scrapping the Udankudi power project. The two leaders are pulling crowds, but the audience reaction in a wave-less election is always difficult to gauge.
Meanwhile, Vijayakanth has pepped up the show with some rib-tickling promises in his manifesto.
The campaign is building up and the rhetoric is sharper, but the absence of momentum is showing. All that could, of course, change rapidly once nominations are scrutinised on April 30 and leaders figure out issues that could decide their fate. There could be more freebies, more emotions and a lot more name-calling.