Budget 2012: Mystery of Pranab’s missing deputy

NEW DELHI: The Dravidian party may not be in a position – or even harbour the desire — to rattle the UPA-II too much, but fear of rival AIADMK upstaging it on the issue of Tamils in Sri Lanka appears to have seen DMK ministers making themselves scarce from the Budget speech on Friday.
The dark, mustachioed figure of S S Palanimanickam was missing when finance minister Pranab Mukherjee rose to make his speech in the Lok Sabha, a break from the past several budgets in UPA I and II, where he has been a fixture as MoS for finance.
Apart from Palanimanickam, the other four remaining DMK ministers – after the exit of A Raja and Dayanidhi Maran – did not turn up either signaling the party’s insistence that the government indicate its support for a resolution at the UN human rights council on atrocities against Tamils at the end of the Lankan civil war.
Most DMK MPs avoided offering a comment on why the ministers were absent with only Rajya Sabha MP T Shiva denying that the leave taking was premeditated. “He (Palanimanickam) is busy in by-elections in Tamil Nadu…That is the only reason and no other reasons (for his absence)," said Siva according to PTI.
Siva insisted that all was well and that “All DMK MPs are here. Do not imagine things as our relation (with Congress) is very good and cordial." For good measure, he even said the budget was “good and growth oriented.”
DMK MPs like T R Baalu and T Elangovan were present, while Rajya Sabha MP Kanimozhi – party chief M Karunanidhi’s daughter – was to be seen in the gallery, the absence of ministers was clearly intended to make a point.
Budget 2012
Budget News 2012