M K Stalin elected DMK President

Forty-five years after he formally entered politics by joining the General Council, M K Stalin on Tuesday succeeded his father M Karunanidhi as the Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (DMK) President, in a smooth transition of generational change in the party’s leadership.

The announcement of Stalin’s election as DMK President was announced by party general secretary K Anbhazhagan formally at the General Council meeting at the Anna Arivalayam here. The party had received only one nomination for the posts of president and hence Stalin was elected unopposed.

With Stalin shedding the Treasurer post which he held since 2009, his lieutenant S Durai Murugan will now be the official financial officer of the DMK. The General Council is the most powerful body in the DMK, according to whose constitution elections will have to be held for the posts of President, General Secretary and Treasurer.

Stalin, 65, was handpicked by his father to lead the DMK and was appointed as Working President when old-age illness confined Karunanidhi to his home in early 2017. The biggest challenge for Stalin is to steer the DMK to victory in the Lok Sabha polls next year and re-install party’s government in Tamil Nadu – where it has never won an election since 2011.

Stalin’s challenge would also be to stitch formidable alliances and ensure that the DMK continues to be a strong player in the national politics too.

With Karunanidhi no more, Stalin has stepped into his father’s large shoes and is expected to have a team of his own – but will not touch the General Secretary post currently occupied by Anbhazhagan, who played second fiddle to Karunanidhi for decades.

Stalin’s transition from working president to president of the DMK was smooth though his elder brother M K Azhagiri made some noise at having been ignored. Azhagiri, who was expelled from the DMK by Karunanidhi in 2014, is desperate to join the party and has organised a rally in Chennai next month as a move to demonstrate his strength.

Stalin entered politics at a very young of 14 when he campaigned for his father and the DMK in the 1967 elections that saw the DMK trouncing Congress and capturing Fort St George, the seat of power of Tamil Nadu Government, for the first time. Later, Stalin was jailed during Emergency and contested his first election in 1984 and lost to AIADMK’s K A Krishnaswamy.

Though he lost to Krishnaswamy yet again in 1991, Stalin has never lost an election after 1996. Though he was in politics for quite a long time, Stalin entered Karunanidhi cabinet only in 2006 and was elevated as Deputy Chief Minister in 2009. He first entered the DMK general council in 1973.

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