The decision the TMC is called upon to take is perhaps one that, in retrospect, it would have been wise to take well before the elections. It would appear to be one that the party only tried to avoid by opting for a `third front'. Its adoption of a stand of equidistance from `communalism' and `corruption', representing the BJP and the AIADMK respectively, may have appeared brave and principled to a minuscule minority of publicopinion. The front it forged with some Dalit organisations on this platform, however, yielded poor electoral dividends. Moopanar and other TMC leaders had conceded that the front was not a front-runner at all, but asserted that it would get around 40 lakh votes. Such a performance, they hoped, would augur well for the emergence of a non-Dravidian, TMC-led alternative in Tamil Nadu by the next assembly elections. It is only about a half of the hoped-for votes that the front has got. But the suitors of the TMC know that this still does not warrant a wishing away or belittling of its base. One explanation for the poor showing is that the vote banks of the TMC and the Pudhiya Thamizhagam were not easily transferable to each other. This may not be the biggest factor behind the front's flop. That would seem to consist in the fact that the `third front' was as unviable a political entity in the state as it has proved elsewhere. Not only because the political competition in the state has come to be one mainly betweenthe two Dravidian contenders of power. Even more because of the polarisation at the national level that the last Lok Sabha polls represented. The impossible dream of equidistance between the two major camps vying for the electorate's mandate can only lead to political irrelevance.