Villupuram: With filing of nominations for the May 16 Assembly elections drawing to a close on Friday afternoon, there was still no hint from the AIADMK general secretary Jayalalithaa on when she would release her party’s manifesto as many in the large crowd anticipated. But ‘Amma’ did not disappoint her cadres, volunteers and well-wishers as she widened the ‘Mother’ metaphor.
It was not just another election rally in the heart of the OBC Vanniyars’ belt here, as the swelling numbers of her party cadres, unmindful of the excruciating pre-summer heat, indicated.
The ‘poll mela’ peaked as thousands of them went into an ecstatic awe, flashing the party’s ‘two leaves’ symbol, as they spotted the chopper carrying their leader fly above the venue, minutes before the rally here.
The sprawling ‘maidan’, encircled by huge cutouts of the AIADMK’s founder-leader M.G. Ramachandran and the present leader Jayalalithaa, was like a large circular theatre, coming alive in larger-than-life dimensions.
Elumalai, a small farmer from Ovaiyarkuppam vividly remembers the first Jayalalithaa regime during 1991-96 for implementing the ‘Jeevandhara’ scheme that enabled him to get agriculture pump-set to augment his water resources in an otherwise rain-fed land.
Young Subash, involved in ‘pandal’ work for the AIADMK’s Villupuram rally, sounded enthusiastic about the polls: “It is a tough fight between AIADMK and DMK this time, but the thought of Vijayakanth pops up in my mind now and then,” he said, laying bare a sense of indecision in the rural youth voters this time.
What at once struck a chord with people, as the DC correspondent spoke to a cross-section of the crowd including women voters, was the way she has been enlarging the ‘Mother’ metaphor through successive election rallies.
Lines from a popular Tamil film song of yesteryear that elevates mother’s love to a special realm filled the air before the rally began. And Jayalalithaa, to her cadres’ roaring approval, did not disappoint the crowd: “Did you ever think that schemes like ‘Amma Unavagams’, ‘Amma Mineral water’, ‘Amma salt’ and ‘Amma Marunthagams’ to help poorer sections will be introduced by me? I did it as a mother who understands her children,” she said.
In a caste-sensitive belt where 13 crucial seats (Villupuram, Gingee, Mayilam, Tindivanam, Vanur, Vikravandi, Thirukovilur, Ulunderpet, Rishivandiyam, Sankarapuram, Kallakurichi, Thiruvannamalai and Keezhpennathur) are at stake, barring two the AIADMK had won 11 of them in 2011 Assembly polls,
Jayalalithaa enlarging the ‘Mother’ metaphor, came with a human touch to the poor. How was ‘Amma’s speech? Pat came an elderly, unshaven man’s reply after the rally: ‘It was like booming gunfire”.
