In her centenary year, a look at Janaki Ramachandran, the first CM to lose power due to “political deadlock”

Tamil Nadu’s first woman Chief Minister Janaki Ramachandran, whose centenary celebration is set to be organised by the AIADMK on Sunday, remains the only person to lose power due to a “political deadlock” in January 1988.

When the Centre had brought the State under the President’s Rule, invoking Article 356 (provisions in case of failure of constitutional machinery in States), it had used the Article for the 73rd time since 1950. Though political instability, defections and the break-up of coalitions, among others, were cited for the Central government’s action, the phrase “political deadlock” was used only with respect to the dismissal of the Janaki Ramachandran Ministry, according to a perusal of the reply given by the Union Ministry of Home Affairs in June 2014 under the Right to Information Act and the report prepared by the Lok Sabha Secretariat in January 2016 on the issue of imposition of the President’s Rule in States.

Materials available with The Hindu archive reveal that the phrase in question was not used even when the Article was used in many States between 2016 and 2021. When Janaki Ramachandran assumed office on January 7, 1988, she had the support of 97 of the 131 MLAs belonging to the ruling party. The other camp, led by Jayalalithaa, had promoted the candidature of V.R. Nedunchezhian, who became the acting Chief Minister consequent to AIADMK leader M.G. Ramachandran’s death in December 1987.

Janaki’s Council of Ministers was compact with seven members, including C. Ponnaiyan, R.M. Veerappan and P.U. Shanmugam, from the MGR’s cabinet. Governor S.L. Khurana had given her three weeks to prove her strength in the Assembly.

The decisions taken by the Janaki regime included the announcement of institution of two awards in the name of MGR, with cash prizes of ₹25,000 each for original books in Tamil on science and technology, and the launch of a free footwear supply scheme at a cost of ₹23 crore to 90 lakh children and 40 lakh women. On January 28, 1988, P.H. Pandian, the then Assembly Speaker, disqualified 33 MLAs when the Janaki Ministry, amid pandemonium, won a vote of confidence with 99 out of 110 members in the House supporting her. While six of the disqualified legislators were covered for having “voluntarily given up” the AIADMK’s membership, 27 others faced the axe for “being absent” at the time of voting. Prior to the voting on the motion, the Congress decided not to support the government while the ruling dispensation had even reached out to the DMK for support. However, the party’s floor leader, Nanjil K. Manoharan, who held discussions with his party boss M. Karunanidhi over the phone twice, later told reporters that there was no change in his party’s stand of opposing the government. Members exchanged blows and mikes were used as missiles.

On January 30, the President’s Rule was imposed in the State with the dissolution of the Assembly, which still had 23 months left for the completion of its tenure. Janaki’s political career came to an end after she herself lost in Andipatti during the Assembly poll in January 1989 and her faction of the AIADMK bagged only one of the 177 seats it contested. With the two factions burying their differences just the next month, Later, the Election Commission, which had frozen the AIADMK’s original symbol of ‘Two Leaves’ before the election, restored it to the unified party.

Denying the suggestion that there was any political agenda behind the party holding the event now, Mr. Ponnaiyan, one of the party’s spokespersons, said the event was meant for honouring the former Chief Minister for her “contributions and sacrifice” to the party. He also praises her for the “gracious and generous” decision to withdraw cases from the Election Commission on the symbol.

J.C.D. Prabhakar, two-time MLA of Villivakkam and an associate of Janaki, recalled that though he had suggested to her in 1989 to accept a post in the unified party, she remained firm against doing so. He added that this was a wise move as otherwise true unity would not have been possible even after the unification. He wanted all those outside of the AIADMK to come back to the fold, and appealed to the party leadership to name the first and second floors of the party office after Janaki Ramachandran and Jayalailthaa.

Kumar Rajendran, advocate and a grand nephew of Janaki, said his grandaunt had not only facilitated the restoration of the symbol and the donation of her property to the party for housing the headquarters but also restored to the organisation a substantial amount of money, which was lying in bank accounts of the party in 1989.

Published - November 24, 2024 01:07 am IST