In 2002, DMK MP C. Kuppusamy filed a PIL against Jayalalithaa seeking prosecution against her for false declaration while filing her nomination papers in four constituencies in the May 2001 assembly elections. Based on a petition filed by Jayalalithaa, the SC on July 10 this year ordered status quo with regard to two cases filed by the Election Commission against her in Bhuvanagiri and Pudukottai.

Following the violence in the Chennai civic polls last December, the AIADMK and DMK’s own allies, the Left parties, went to court, seeking re-election. When the case came up before a division bench in the Madras High Court, Justice Ibrahim Kalifulla described the violent incidents as “an extraordinary situation warranting an extraordinary remedy”. The judge flayed the state election commissioner for “behaving in a highly irresponsible manner” in not using his powers to stop the violence. Jayalalithaa and her party colleagues did not fail to recall the observations at public meetings.

In anticipation of snap polls, political parties virtually queued up before the courts against opponents. The state BJP has threatened to move the court against Chief Minister Karunanidhi for “hurting religious sentiments” with his anti-Ram statements. The ruling DMK, for its part, has encouraged a local panchayat leader in Kodanadu to file a petition in the local court against Jayalalithaa for alleged violations in the construction of ‘a palatial bungalow’ in her estates there. Call this the politics of going to courts, but in TN the trend has come to stay.