Election campaign.....
Elections have always been memorable, whether it was in high school or in college or in politics. There's always huge noisy crowds (most of them drunk), shouting, swearing, banners lined up against the wall, incomplete paintings and hoardings, and lot of activities.
So, the election story that i am referring to is in 3 Star. The story began like this, Annachi (the king maker in the area) was the Vatta Cheyalalar for ADMK in MGR nagar district. His position earned him nothin but a free dhoti and white shirt once in a while and some free cheap drinks from the star guys or the loyal associates for sorting out problems. The problem he dealt with were very minor, petty fights and buying and selling of waste paper.......No one knew what the actual Velusaamy was made of, his true colour (jet black)......
The counselor elections were nearing and there have been a lot of nominations being filed. Everyone of the "vetti" star mob was asking annachi, if he had filed nomination.....Annachi, deriving some cheap pride in this comment used to respond saying "namma aatchi ellam over, inume namma yaaravadhu valathu vidanum".......as though he was tired of running the state government for 10 years.......
Everyone thought it was a big joke until we met the scape goat. Yes, none other than Dravida mani and his brother Chezhian the fox. The deal was that Annachi will campaign for dravida mani and assure him victory while chezhian would fund the election campaign. Once elected, dravida mani will rule the district with the able counselling of annachi and company. It all seemed perfect. What a plan !!!!!!!
So, the activities started in full swing. We could see kabali was into the banner program, madhi took the transportation and finances, cheta was the bunk supplier for the mob including tea, cigarettes etc, Annachi's den was the place where we planned for the "Kalla Vote" activities and the restaurant was the store room. There were about 100 cycles, 20 bikes and an Half cut Auto with a tubelight on top. You are right, that was dravida mani's campaigning vehicle. He had no interest in bullet proof vehicles and BMW's, he was rajiv ghandhi types..down to earth and always with public walking with them.......what a joke he was with his frenchie.....
Now, what was our role? We were the only educated "gumbal" in all of 3 Star and only we could speak and write english (Although i think bharath, ram and karna) were not counted in this even then). Anyways, our responsibility was to campaign for dravida mani in english and cover the middle class mass. The members jackie, iyan, bharath, ram, karna, lawyer, krishna,suchi. Kadir and balaraman were not impressed with the idea and rajesh too opted out of it. I still remember kadir's dialogue "ivan periya junni, ivanukku naan campaign pannanuma".....
It was a globally known fact that this was a bull shit activity but all of us were thrilled by elections and the free tea and cigarettes. The offer was too good to refuse. Biriyaani and old monk peg always go hand in hand with elections......
We distributed the areas for campaigning. Suchi was in charge of 1st and 2nd sector and he was out in every house with his hands in prayer position....his dialogue was "ammmaaaa suyarchi" "akkaaaa suyarchi" "aiyaaaa suyarchi". In fact i remember one of the ladies had bought some rice and old food thiking it was a beggar outside. However suchi stuck to his job and did a marvellous job in the end.
Iyan, and I were on one bike, bharath and krishna on the other, shouting at the top of our voice. It was fun, we shouted "Podungaya votu......" and they responded "mezhuguvathiya paaathu".......man, it was a super comedy......BTW, the burning candle was our man's "chinnam"...
Kaushik was in the auto with the king himself. He had the accent and was assigned the task of talking in english in the educated areas of MGR nagar and ESI quaters. We still doubt if people like that existed, but we took the call. Here is an example to support it, Kaushik was shouting "Please vote for the burning candidate" and everyone was clapping.......it was all greek and latin for them.....
Lawyer was the cleverest of all. He dint participate much in the campaign. He chose back stage activities like banners, posters etc. Once in a while shopping too. Since the account was with cheta (the bunk store owner) lawyer was busy buying shampoos, soaps and goli soda......
Karna and ram had befriended the great "Thogudhi", who had spent 60 years in election campaigning. They were busy drinking old monk and discovered the long gone habit of accepting the glass of old monk in a humble way........they discussed all possible topics, nagar economy, nagar adi news, nagar stock market were just some of them......
The election began and it was thrilling day. It was raining that day and we spent all the time in going to different booths to caste multiple votes. Ram finished first with 12 votes (he had lost a good part of his nail), iyan was second with 11 votes and all the other were much behind with 2 or 3. But we counted our votes and saw that it came to exactly 40. Not bad we thought.......
The next day was the result day. We came in late that day and found all our kings and ministers in a disappointed state. We got the message, we lost the elections. Annachi came and told us.....there is no way that we would have lost....."pottiya maathittanga paa".......in return i enquired, "annachi evvalo vote vandhudhu".......the reply was a shock for us ....."40"
Since then we were always confused about one thing.....Whom did "dravida mani" vote for????????
So, the election story that i am referring to is in 3 Star. The story began like this, Annachi (the king maker in the area) was the Vatta Cheyalalar for ADMK in MGR nagar district. His position earned him nothin but a free dhoti and white shirt once in a while and some free cheap drinks from the star guys or the loyal associates for sorting out problems. The problem he dealt with were very minor, petty fights and buying and selling of waste paper.......No one knew what the actual Velusaamy was made of, his true colour (jet black)......
The counselor elections were nearing and there have been a lot of nominations being filed. Everyone of the "vetti" star mob was asking annachi, if he had filed nomination.....Annachi, deriving some cheap pride in this comment used to respond saying "namma aatchi ellam over, inume namma yaaravadhu valathu vidanum".......as though he was tired of running the state government for 10 years.......
Everyone thought it was a big joke until we met the scape goat. Yes, none other than Dravida mani and his brother Chezhian the fox. The deal was that Annachi will campaign for dravida mani and assure him victory while chezhian would fund the election campaign. Once elected, dravida mani will rule the district with the able counselling of annachi and company. It all seemed perfect. What a plan !!!!!!!
So, the activities started in full swing. We could see kabali was into the banner program, madhi took the transportation and finances, cheta was the bunk supplier for the mob including tea, cigarettes etc, Annachi's den was the place where we planned for the "Kalla Vote" activities and the restaurant was the store room. There were about 100 cycles, 20 bikes and an Half cut Auto with a tubelight on top. You are right, that was dravida mani's campaigning vehicle. He had no interest in bullet proof vehicles and BMW's, he was rajiv ghandhi types..down to earth and always with public walking with them.......what a joke he was with his frenchie.....
Now, what was our role? We were the only educated "gumbal" in all of 3 Star and only we could speak and write english (Although i think bharath, ram and karna) were not counted in this even then). Anyways, our responsibility was to campaign for dravida mani in english and cover the middle class mass. The members jackie, iyan, bharath, ram, karna, lawyer, krishna,suchi. Kadir and balaraman were not impressed with the idea and rajesh too opted out of it. I still remember kadir's dialogue "ivan periya junni, ivanukku naan campaign pannanuma".....
It was a globally known fact that this was a bull shit activity but all of us were thrilled by elections and the free tea and cigarettes. The offer was too good to refuse. Biriyaani and old monk peg always go hand in hand with elections......
We distributed the areas for campaigning. Suchi was in charge of 1st and 2nd sector and he was out in every house with his hands in prayer position....his dialogue was "ammmaaaa suyarchi" "akkaaaa suyarchi" "aiyaaaa suyarchi". In fact i remember one of the ladies had bought some rice and old food thiking it was a beggar outside. However suchi stuck to his job and did a marvellous job in the end.
Iyan, and I were on one bike, bharath and krishna on the other, shouting at the top of our voice. It was fun, we shouted "Podungaya votu......" and they responded "mezhuguvathiya paaathu".......man, it was a super comedy......BTW, the burning candle was our man's "chinnam"...
Kaushik was in the auto with the king himself. He had the accent and was assigned the task of talking in english in the educated areas of MGR nagar and ESI quaters. We still doubt if people like that existed, but we took the call. Here is an example to support it, Kaushik was shouting "Please vote for the burning candidate" and everyone was clapping.......it was all greek and latin for them.....
Lawyer was the cleverest of all. He dint participate much in the campaign. He chose back stage activities like banners, posters etc. Once in a while shopping too. Since the account was with cheta (the bunk store owner) lawyer was busy buying shampoos, soaps and goli soda......
Karna and ram had befriended the great "Thogudhi", who had spent 60 years in election campaigning. They were busy drinking old monk and discovered the long gone habit of accepting the glass of old monk in a humble way........they discussed all possible topics, nagar economy, nagar adi news, nagar stock market were just some of them......
The election began and it was thrilling day. It was raining that day and we spent all the time in going to different booths to caste multiple votes. Ram finished first with 12 votes (he had lost a good part of his nail), iyan was second with 11 votes and all the other were much behind with 2 or 3. But we counted our votes and saw that it came to exactly 40. Not bad we thought.......
The next day was the result day. We came in late that day and found all our kings and ministers in a disappointed state. We got the message, we lost the elections. Annachi came and told us.....there is no way that we would have lost....."pottiya maathittanga paa".......in return i enquired, "annachi evvalo vote vandhudhu".......the reply was a shock for us ....."40"
Since then we were always confused about one thing.....Whom did "dravida mani" vote for????????
posted by Anand at 11:27 PM
2 Comments:
sooper da raama, enna than namma competetor'a irundhaalum, CPWD'la vote podambodhu, namma onna thanni adichom....appa than potti vandhu nammala kettan "ooth pothiya"....
One correctio,
The results didn't come on the next day because I remember after the election, Karna asking Annan Dravida Mani; "Eppadi annachi chance irukka". For that Dravida Mani replied "Aapu irukku" ... He meant hope irukku. Before the DMK candidate changed the "potti".
Dravida Mani did not get 40 votes . He got 16 votes finishing last behind one guy from CPWD quarters who quit his govt. job.
Further investigation showed that Ram and iyan voted for DMK and not our elder brother Dravida Mani.
After that Dravida Mani was never to be seen .
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