When Manmohan Singh demonstrated his negotiation skills in Tamil Nadu

Former Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, widely known as an eminent economist, had a facet that was relatively less talked about — he was a skilful negotiator in seat sharing, that too with strong-willed leaders such as Jayalalithaa of the All India Anna Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (AIADMK) and M. Karunanidhi of the Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (DMK). 

Former Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, widely known as an eminent economist, had a facet that was relatively less talked about — he was a skilful negotiator in seat sharing, that too with strong-willed leaders such as Jayalalithaa of the All India Anna Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (AIADMK) and M. Karunanidhi of the Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (DMK). 

In the run-up to the 1999 Lok Sabha polls, Dr. Singh, accompanied by Kerala’s former Chief Minister A.K. Antony, visited Chennai a few times to hold talks with Jayalalithaa, and nearly five years later, with Karunanidhi, on his own. On both occasions, he, as a key emissary of the then Congress president Sonia Gandhi, succeeded in getting a decent number of Lok Sabha seats for his party, despite the other side being tough in giving away the seats initially. As the former PM was conscious of his party’s diminished strength in Tamil Nadu, especially after the formation of Tamil Maanila Congress (Moopanar) in April 1996, he knew that unlike in many other States, the Congress had to play the role of a junior partner to either of the Dravidian forces.

However, in 1999, the main task for Dr. Singh lay in manouvering the party to a position of relative comfort, as after all, between 1984 and 1996, the Congress contested in two-thirds of Lok Sabha constituencies — popularly called MGR’s formula (named after the AIADMK’s founder M.G. Ramachandran) — in the company of the AIADMK. But, when the party faced the electorate in 1998 for the first time, without the support of the two Dravidian forces since 1971, it drew a blank and secured about 4.8% of the votes polled. More importantly, it forfeited deposit in all the 35 seats it contested, including in Nagercoil (now called Kanniyakumari), a traditional stronghold.  

The election in 1999 was necessitated by a combination of factors, the main being the AIADMK’s withdrawal of support to the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP)-led regime, led by Atal Bihari Vajpayee, earlier that year. Also, a few weeks before Vajpayee’s ministry was voted out of power by the Lok Sabha, Jayalalithaa and Sonia Gandhi met at a tea party hosted by Subramanian Swamy, who was the then president of the Janata Party.

When Dr. Singh and Mr. Antony met Jayalalithaa for 90 minutes at her Poes Gardens residence on June 3, 1999, the former PM described the talks as “frank, cordial discussions” about electoral adjustments for the Lok Sabha polls. At that time, the DMK and the BJP had also come together. Dr. Singh displayed his understanding of the political situation of Tamil Nadu, when he observed that “Tamil Nadu is known for its rationalist and secular outlook and the people of Tamil Nadu will judge.” The main issue between the two sides was over the number of seats. Jayalalithaa was willing to part with not more than five seats, as mentioned in a report of The Hindu on June 27, 1999, whereas the Congress considered it too few and it was keen on going back to the MGR’s formula. She had offered to set apart 15 seats if the Congress managed to bring in the TMC(M) to the alliance. Eventually, Jayalalithaa allotted 12 seats to the Congress even without the TMC(M).  The national party had bagged three seats including Puducherry.

The subsequent years saw the ties of the AIADMK and the Congress getting deteriorated. Jayalalithaa had again played the “foreigner” card against Ms. Gandhi. In January 2004, the Congress chief had deputed only Dr. Singh to hold talks with Karunanidhi, who had just then quit the BJP-led National Democratic Alliance (NDA).