When former Tamil Nadu chief minister M Karunanidhi landed in Delhi this morning, he must have been all too aware of the contrast between this and other visits undertaken by him in the last seven years. Earlier as a powerful ally of the party in power, he was feted and welcomed with important doors in Lutyen’s Delhi being held open for him. This morning he arrived in Delhi to visit his daughter MK Kanimozhi in jail, and his allies, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, away in Africa, and UPA chairperson Sonia Gandhi in Pathankot have strong signals that he was, after all, on his own.
As he settled himself in his suite at New Delhi’s Taj Mahal hotel at Mansingh Road, senior Congress leader Digvijay Singh too walked in. He had other business in the hotel, he said, and was not to meet Karunanidhi. The former CM, travelled to Tihar Jail, Asia’s biggest, where his daughter has been lodged over her alleged involvement in the 2G scam in a fleet of cars and an ambulance named, oddly enough ?Goodman Rescue.?
He met his daughter along with Rajathi Ammal, his third wife and Kanimozhi’s mother, at the jail superintendent’s office. ?It was a very emotional meeting which went on for about 20 minutes after which Kalaignar was very disturbed,? said one of his aides.
Karunanidhi was supposed to go straight to the airport from the jail, but changed his mind and came back to the hotel. ?He was disturbed and is not keeping good health, on the way in, he was quite sick on the plane,? said a source in the DMK.
?He is still undecided whether he would try and see Kanimozhi again on Tuesday or go back to Chennai,? the source added. In court on Monday, Union chemicals and fertillisers minister MK Alagiri’s wife Kanthi too reached out to Kanimozhi. Alagiri is Kanimozhi’s step brother.
Later in the day, home minister P Chidambaram met Karunanidhi.