11 May 2002
TMC MERGER INTO CONG ROUND THE
CORNER
From Jal Khambata
NEW DELHI:
Congress President Sonia Gandhi has approved merger of the Tamil
Mannila Congress (TMC) into the party and is rushing AICC Secretary
Ramesh Chennithala, who is incharge of the Tamil Nadu desk in the
party, to Chennai Saturday night to complete the
formalities.
Chennithala said the party president wants the
merger to take place prior to the three Assembly by-elections taking
place in Tamil Nadu this month and and hence she asked him to first
complete this task and then resume the responsibility of getting the
Congress unseat the BJP government in the Assembly elections.
TMC,
a breakaway group of the Congress, was floated by stalwart G K
Moopanar who is no more and his son G K Vassan who took the party's
reigns after Moopanar's death was elected to the Rajya Sabha last
month, paving the way for the merger.
Congress has just seven
MLAs while TMC has 23 and as such the TMC merger into the Congress
will give the Congress the position of the main Opposition. At
present, PMK holds the opposition leadership in the Tamil Nadu
Assembly.
The Tamil Nadu politics watchers, however, say the
merger talks surface almost every year before the birth anniversary
of Kamraj on July 15 but these finally fizzle out as a section of the
TMC leadership does not want to lose their autonomy that they
achieved when Moopanar broke away from the Congress. As such, they
say the TMC may spring some roadblock to frustrate the latest attempt
of merger as well. END