DMK strategy to escape scam taint

Is the issue of alleged military atrocities committed against Tamil civilians during the fierce anti-LTTE civil war in Sri Lanka in 2009 the real reason for DMK exiting the United Progressive Alliance (UPA) after nine years in the coalition? 

Tamil Nadu and DMK-watchers from the CPI, the AIADMK and the BJP believe that the real reasons for the DMK quitting the UPA is not what it is being professed to be.

It is being argued that the DMK has been unhappy with the way the Congress has handled the 2G spectrum allocation scandal, in which DMK chief Karunanidhi’s trusted lieutenant and former telecommunications minister A Raja and his daughter Kanimozhi were arrested on non-bailable warrants for investigation by the CBI. But the DMK could not have walked out over the family issue. It would have harmed the party’s political image.

The other reason is that the DMK fears that the battered image of the Congress and the UPA-II would harm its own political standing in the state, and it would pave the way for arch-rival AIADMK to decimate the party. The only way to salvage its own political assets was to leave the Congress. Had the DMK continued in the UPA for the remaining part of the coalition’s term in office, the perception was that the party would have paid a big price in the 2014 Lok Sabha election.

Another reason the DMK had to step up its aggressive campaign over the Lankan Tamils question was the fact that the ruling AIADMK had launched a campaign and it would have been fatal for the DMK to let the rival walk away with the political prize.

What remains an open question is whether the DMK can wash its hands of UPA scandals by walking out of the government a few years too late and whether the people in the state will forgive the DMK for its association with a tainted Congress/UPA.

@ParsaJr