JOIN USIf a pivotal aspect of Rajaji’s critique against the Congress at the Centre then was to do away with the “corruption-breeding permit-quota-license Raj” while encouraging the growth of a regional party like the DMK to battle the former, the Dravidian outfit as a Congress ally in New Delhi is now flummoxed with the fallout of the alleged irregularities involving its Telecom Minister A Raja, in grant of licences to mobile operators.
With corruption taint on Raja becoming untenable for the DMK forcing him to quit on Sunday, life has come a full circle for the 87-year-old DMK patriarch M Karunanidhi. Raja met Karunanidhi twice, once last night and again on Sunday, sources said. In the first meeting, former Union Shipping and Highways Minister T R Baalu was also present along with the DMK’s Rajya Sabha MP, Kanimozhi. Earlier, Raja is learnt to have clearly told his party leader that he would rather quit for now than risk Parliament being again stalled for the rest of the ongoing winter session on this count.
Sources said that Raja told the DMK leader that he would “prove his innocence in the Courts and come back” instead of sticking it out in his present controversial Telecom portfolio. Apparently, Karunanidhi later sent a word through the Baalu, DMK’s Parliamentary Party leader, to the Congress high command, hours before Raja quit.
However, a cockish Raja had sounded confident on Sunday evening and told reporters at the Chennai airport that the question of his “resigning from the Cabinet” had not arisen “as of now”. Raja’s resignation has fuelled speculations about Kanimozhi Karunanidhi succeeding him to that Cabinet post.
However, Kanimozhi herself ducked the issue of joining the Cabinet to a television channel in Chennai saying, “you are talking to a Member of Parliament who will continue to be a Member of Parliament.” Baalu as well as T K S Elangovan, North Chennai MP is in the race for a Cabinet berth in UPA-II.