After being routed by their arch rival AIADMK in the 2011 assembly elections, the party with defeat on their hands had added another round of drubbing in the corporation polls and bypolls. The Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam seems to be groping in the dark

Karunanidhi’s ability to lead the party to success in future elections pose a big question mark on the future of the Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam, and his age is not helping it either. Rumours are rife that Karunanidhi has been trying to name his son MK Stalin as his successor; the octogenarian leader has not been able to succeed on an open platform, as he faces resentment from his elder son MK Alagiri. His third wife Rajathiammal, for her part, too, wanted her daughter Kanimozhi to have a big share in the pie. However, Kanimozhi’s alleged involvement in the spectrum scam has made her elevation in the party doubtful.

When Mamata Banerjee swept away the Left Front and became Chief Minister of West Bengal earlier this year, expectations had preceded her. She had many tasks at hand, one of them being bringing Maoists to the negotiating table. Some 100 days into her tenure, she has scored a few points, including a tripartite agreement with the Gorkha Janmukti Morcha (GJM).

But restoring peace in the Darjeeling hills is not the same as doing it in Jangalmahal forests. The more days pass by, it becomes obvious that the Mamata government does not have a clear-cut Naxal policy. Making peace overtures in conflict management means nothing unless preceded, or at least, accompanied by confidence-building measures.

Urban voters, aware of the 2G affair, are seen as a deadly threat to the DMK and the alliance it heads

Will Tamilnadu vote against corruption or wink at it? The question is waiting to be answered this April.

With the Election Commission putting parties on a short leash, both the ruling DMK and the Opposition find themselves not quite ready to face the electorate on April 13. Logistical and other nonpolitical factors contributed to this unpreparedness, along with a lack of issues until 2G and other scams raised a storm.

In Gaddar, the people of Telangana have yet another weapon for the cause of a separate statehood. The revolutionary Telugu balladeer and vocal spokesperson for causes, Gummadi Vittal Rao, has been singing paeans to Telengana since 1969. How successful will he be in his new avatar as an advocate of parliamentary democracy? Will Telengana happen in his lifetime?

The young man who broke upon the scene in 1971 with ‘Stop Rickshaw-walla; I am coming; You work from morning to night, but your stomach cannot be filled; So much blood and sweat, yet you earn hardly anything’, that reverberated on the streets of Hyderabad for years, says he is ready to take his shepherd’s outfit into the high portals of parliamentary democracy, through the legitimate election route.