It's all Karunanidhi at Tamil conference

Coimbatore: The Classical Tamil Conference was to showcase the history of one of world's oldest languages but political commentators and the Opposition believe it ended up promoting and praising Chief Minister M Karunanidhi and his DMK party.

The five-day conference in Coimbatore ended on Sunday, and the Karunanidhi family was seen and heard throughout it.

Karunanidhi's son and Deputy Chief Minister M K Stalin shuttled between Chennai and Coimbatore to oversee arrangements for the conference. Karunanidhi's daughter Kanimozhi ensured that Tamil scholars from across the globe attend the meet to present papers.

Karunanidhi's granddaughters Kayalvizhi Venkatesh and Ezhilarasi sang poems and played the Veena at the conference.

At least 20 scholars presented research papers on Karunanidhi and his works. Karunanidhi, a Tamil scholar himself, has never missed an opportunity to highlight his language skills and this time it was no different.

He was seen crisscrossing the 20 venues, where poet meets, seminars and symposiums on Tamil had been organised. Speakers after speakers praised him for organizing the conference.

K Sivathambi, a Tamil scholar from Sri Lanka and convener of the academic sessions, described Karunanidhi as "World Tamils leader" and requested him to help Tamils all over the globe.

Sivathambi is a LTTE sympathizer and his statements come at a time when the UN has decided to set up a panel to investigate allegations of human rights violations during the last months of the government's war against separatist Tamil rebels.

The DMK had always portrayed a pro-Tamil image in elections and won the 1967 assembly polls ousting Congress.

During that poll, the DMK put the 1965 anti-Hindi movement as its main plank. The first DMK government headed by its founder C N Annadurai lost no time in organising a World Tamil Conference in Chennai in 1968, a year after it came to power.

Ever since, all state governments, either DMK or AIADMK, have organised world Tamil conferences.

AIADMK founder M G Ramachandran hosted a conferences in Madurai in 1981. In 1993, AIADMK leader and then Chief Minister Jayalalithaa hosted a conference in Thanjavur.

Karunanidhi's conference comes ahead of the 2011 Assembly polls, and it was held in eastern Tamil Nadu where DMK didn’t do well in the last Lok Sabha polls. Coimbatore, Triuppur, Erode and Pollachi, all located in this belt, returned AIADMK-led front nominees.

AIADMK and MDMK boycotted the conference, alleging that it was only a "publicity blitz" for the DMK.

Veteran journalist and political commentator Cho Ramasamy called the purpose of the conference was to "praise and praise" Karunanidhi.

Jayalalithaa said that the conference had only "sung the praises of Karunanidhi" and will not achieve anything tangible.