Gurumurthy, the editor of Thuglak Magazine confirmed Tamil Superstar Rajinikanth’s plunge into politics the day before in an interview with Republic TV. In an interview with Republic TV’s editor-in-chief Arnab Goswami, RSS ideologue Gurumurthy said that Rajnikanth would float his own party.
Now it is just a matter of time for the Tamil superstar to enter politics. There is a political vacuum in Tamil Nadu after the demise of former chief minister J Jayalalithaa and also since the DMK chief Karunanidhi is not involved in active politics. There are leaders of other parties like MK Stalin, O Panneerselvam and others. However, there is always a special space for Rajinikanth in the field of politics and this certainly cannot be denied.
Rajinikanth is a person who has a high stature and is even considered to be ‘god’ by many Tamil people. However, will Rajinikanth be an apt politician and a leader? This is the big question that has been lingering in the minds of the people. The actor himself speculated his debut into politics during his meet and greet event with his fans in Chennai.
Rajinikanth is a great actor who has been admired by all but when it comes to politics, one should have certain qualities which the actor has to seriously look into before his political entry. The superstar projects himself as a fearless man on screen but is he so in reality? Rajinikanth has not recently raised his voice in support of the Tamil people for any of the issues which got widespread attention. For instance, the Jallikattu issue or the farmer protests in Delhi for the constitution of the Cauvery management board and for the waiver of farm loans.
The actor even cancelled his plan to visit Sri Lanka when unfavourable voices came up from Tamil groups. Rajinikanth, during his 5-day meet and greet function, said that the system needs to be changed. If that is the case, then he should have criticised the demonetisation move by the centre. Instead, the actor tweeted hailing the Prime Minister on his move.
Unlike Rajinikanth, Ilayathalapathy Vijay has raised his voice in favour of the Tamil people for issues such as demonetisation, Jallikattu and even for the farmer crisis in the recent Behindwoods award function. He’s shown a lot of promise as far as politics is concerned. It’s high time that Rajinikanth spoke up in order to express his perspectives on the various issues the state is facing.
One of the major challenges ahead for the actor will be his place of birth. Rajinikanth is actually a Marathi who was born in Karnataka and later shifted to Tamil Nadu. Already, there are voices coming from other Tamil groups saying that a person born in another state should not rule them. This situation is even being compared with that of Sonia Gandhi, where she was not allowed to rule the country as she was born in Italy.
As far as his place of birth is concerned, anybody can rule the state. After all, they belong to our country and there is no separate citizenship given for a particular state. The actor, who has been on friendly terms with almost all political figures in the country, will now be pushed to face them as rivals when he steps into politics. Rajinikanth should prepare himself before he steps in.
There will always a warm welcome for Thalaiva but he should remember that Tamils have been stabbed many times already. So, he should not make them say, “Et tu, Thalaiva?”