Kanimozhi with husband G Aravindan outside the Patiala House Court complex in New Delhi after the hearing on Friday. Picture by Prem Singh

Chennai, May 6: The DMK is like a family — the cliché often mouthed by M. Karunanidhi took on a different interpretation today as his daughter Kanimozhi battled to save herself from getting jailed in the 2G scam.

Kanimozhi distanced herself from former Union telecom minister A. Raja, telling a CBI court: “Even if A. Raja got transferred the bribe money… what is the charge against me?”

The stand made it clear the family was more important than the party or one of its loyalists.

Raja, whom Karunanidhi had initially defended saying he was being targeted because he is a Dalit, has become a convenient scapegoat now that the DMK chief’s daughter is in the line of fire.

The DMK also sent out other signals that Kanimozhi mattered more to the party and its leadership than Raja.

For a start, the party has fielded leading lawyer Ram Jethmalani to defend her. No such top advocate was picked for Raja. The former minister had to get one of his advocate friends to seek out a good defence lawyer once the chargesheet was filed.

Also, a phalanx of DMK MPs turned up in the CBI court with Kanimozhi today. One of them, Aadhi Shankar, even swooned in the heat. When Raja was produced in court for the first time, not a single MP showed up.

But DMK spokesperson T.K.S. Elangovan insisted Jethmalani’s argument was only part of legal strategy to get bail for Kanimozhi and that it did not reflect the party’s stand on Raja. “We still believe he is innocent till proven guilty by the court,” he said.

Raja’s supporters though are in no mood to buy that line. “The party did not hold any high-level committee meeting when Raja got arrested. It was a coincidence that the general council was anyway scheduled to meet on February 3, the day after his arrest. But the moment Kanimozhi got chargesheeted, they (the party) summoned such a high-level meeting, consulted senior lawyers, and our leader (Karunanidhi) even considered going with her to Delhi to be present in the court. And now Raja is being openly defamed in the court by Kanimozhi’s lawyer just to get her bail. All this proves that blood is thicker than the political loyalty of our MP,” fumed a DMK functionary from Perambalur, Raja’s hometown.

To shield Kanimozhi from allegations about the Kalaignar TV receiving kickbacks, Jethmalani shifted the blame of decision-making on managing director Sharad Kumar saying he should be held accountable and not Kanimozhi who he said was a passive director.

The Karunanidhi family had earlier promised Sharad’s wife it would defend him in court.