P Chidambaram tries two-for-one deal to sell son Karti's candidature

SIVAGANGA: How does finance minister P Chidambaram hard sell the candidature of son Karti Chidambaram, who is on his maiden electoral venture in a seat where the arithmetic is not exactly stacked up in his favour? The answer is to present it as a two-for-one deal.

"If you have a heart problem, don’t you go to a doctor even if he is a 40 year old? Would you hesitate before hiring a 40-yearold engineer to build your house? Bill Gates, one of the world’s richest men has entrusted the financial side of his company to a 45 year old, so why not a younger candidate to represent you?" he says to a crowd o f Congress loyalists in Manamadurai. "You would anyway be getting two people who care for the area, for the price of one vote," he adds to much laughter from the audience.

The Sivaganga seat is hardly a slam dunk for the Congress and both father and son realise the odds. In 2009, Congress narrowly won the seat despite an alliance with the DMK. Now with AIADMK, DMK and BJP in fray, the last of which has some backing from Vaiko and Vijaykanth, in the fray, the race is not easy.

"It is a tough fight, I know, but I have a plan, let’s see," says Karti Chidambaram. His style is more snappy than his father, his speech much shorter and to the point. While his father points to the historic role of the Congress and its liberal ethos, Karti Chidambaram chooses to attack the AIADMK.

"There is a basic fundamental difference between the AIADMK and the Congress. The AIADMK has only concentrated on setting up TASMAC (government liquor stores), their emphasis is that you should kudi, kudi, kudi (drink, drink, drink) whereas the Congress has opened up as many as 75 branches of various banks in the area to disperse educational loans to padi, padi, padi (read, read, read)," he says to applause.

The two plan to undertake joint campaigns in the early phase. "I’ll start campaigning on my own after the nomination process is over," says Karti Chidambaram. As a new candidate he is learning to deal with Election Commission codes and rules. "We had a problem with my car, and the EC says I can’t take another to campaign. Anyway, par for the course."

Just a 10-minute drive away from where the Congress is trying to hold its ground is the AIADMK office. Pictures of CM J Jayalalithaa signal that we are in Amma territory. The office has a few people hanging around chatting, with a separate tent by its side to accommodate larger crowds for evening sessions.