REALLY LONG POST ALERT!

This is essentially a repost of an article I had written almost 12 years ago, that has suddenly become pertinent once again! Back then, Telugu superstar Chiranjeevi had just announced his entry into the thorny world of politics. Having witnessed the likes of NTR, MGR and Jayalalitha successfully make the transition, Chiru hoped that his demigod status among the masses would help him ride the elevator that goes from the film city to the official Chief Minister's residence! 12 years since, he has all but retreated from active politics, and has returned to the familiar ambience of Telugu cinema.

Now, apparently it is the Thalaivaa's turn to chance his luck!

Although, by saying he "never aspired to be chief minister", Rajinikanth may have inadvertently, and rather naively, nipped his own political journey in the bud! He has been issuing statements of support for political parties and ideologies since the mid-1990s, if not earlier, when he was at the peak of his powers. But that doesn't seem to have had the effect he would have hoped for. For e.g., since the last few years Thalaivaa has openly expressed his affection for the BJP and Narendrabhai, but that has hardly had any impact on the saffron party's fortunes in the state. Similarly, despite his outburst against the PMK, the Vanniyar political outfit swept all its seats in the 2004 elections!

Thalaivaa didn't help his own cause either, when on the last day of 2017 he announced the imminent formation of a political party that would contest all 234 seats in TN. 2 years and 3 months since then, he only has Kaala, 2.0, Petta and Darbar (which incidentally was a box-office disaster!) to show for his efforts, with not an iota of progress on the political front.

Questions have, therefore, been raised about his sincerity! People need to see his commitment to politics, and to the people's causes. And that will only happen if he positions himself as the face of change. He cannot be a supporting actor - people are not used to seeing him that way. He needs to be the main lead, and in the fray!

And even that may not always help, as his colleague and competitor from the Tamil industry, Kamal Haasan, found out in the 2019 General Elections! His party MNM (Makkal Needhi Maiam) had its torchlight shut out and lost deposits in all the 37 seats it contested across TN and Puducherry! An epic disaster!

That then raises an important question. What made the likes of NTR, MGR and Amma the cult figures that they were? While several successful Indian actors have made it big in politics (KentDevi Hema Malini, Smriti Irani, Sunil Dutt to name just few), why have they not been known to provoke the kind of mass hysteria like the trio did?

Let us take a quick look at their journeys and their rise in politics. That should help us find an answer to our question.

Tamil Nadu (or the Madras Presidency as it was then called) had always had important Congress leaders, C. Rajagopalachari or Rajaji (Independent India’s first Indian Governor-General) probably being the most well known of them all. Another popular leader was ex-Congressman E.V. Ramasamy Naicker or Periyar as he was fondly called. Periyar quit the Congress in 1925 when he felt the party was only serving the interests of Brahmins and started a “Self Respect Movement”. He questioned the subjugation of non-Brahmin Dravidian people, and formed the Justice Party, later renamed as Dravidar Kazhagam, aimed at achieving an egalitarian society, one where the backward classes had equal human rights. But it was pretty much a social movement and not a political force, until the genius of Annadurai liked the movement to a Dravidian entity calling for an independent Dravida Nadu and broadened its base. This was also the time when the state was witnessing protests against the Centre’s decision to force Hindi as the sole National Language of India, and a compulsory subject in schools, so the movement quickly gathered steam among the Dravidian masses. After Annadurai broke away from Periyar’s DK and formed his own Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (DMK), he got two very useful allies in this struggle – film writer M. Karunanidhi and the charismatic actor MGR.

Cinema has always been a very potent medium, and film heroes all over the world making a strong impact on people isn’t very difficult to comprehend. So when MGR started spreading the message of DMK through his films such as the 1966 cult classic Anbe Vaa, he became the face of the Dravidian Movement. Although he later broke away to form a separate All India Anna Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (AIADMK) in 1972, after differences with the then chief minister Karunanidhi, he had already garnered the support of the masses, enough to make him win every election till his death in 1987. His legacy was later inherited and ably advanced by another film star, Ms. Jayalalitha.

Starting with her rousing "Pennin Perumai" ("The Greatness of a Woman") speech, Amma undertook several initiatives for the upliftment of women in the state. She also invited Ford to establish business in TN in 1995, thus opening the door to numerous other automobile companies and creating an auto-hub in the state.

To be noted at this juncture is the fact that it was Annadurai’s Dravidian politics that had created the platform for MGR to form a party which people could associate with. Otherwise, a Malayali Menon born in Sri Lanka had little chance of ruling a state like TN. Jayalalitha, on the other hand, succeeded in part because of her early involvement in Dravidian politics, and partly because of her leadership and the economic progress she brought about in her state.

Now let's turn our attention to NTR, another charismatic hero who ruled Telugu cinema for decades, along with other stalwarts like Akkineni Nageswara Rao. In the early 1980s, there already was significant discontent among the masses against the Congress government, on accounts of unemployment, corruption and general anti-incumbency. And then, in 1982, came the unfortunate incident of chief minister Anjaiah being publicly humiliated at the Hyderabad airport by the then General Secretary of Congress, a certain Rajiv Gandhi! The incident hurt the pride of Telugus across the state, and acted as the last straw that broke Congress's back! NTR timed his move well, floated the Telugu Desam Party (TDP) and went into the elections 9 months later with a call for restoring Telugu “Atma Gauravam” (self-pride). He won a landslide and became the CM.

However, NTR’s political career shows us that even a megastar like him couldn’t stay in power just with the sheer clout of stardom. In his first term as CM, NTR got into saffron robes and tried ruling the state ideologically, leading to disastrous consequences. He ended up losing the elections in 1989. The Telugu public rejected his whimsical and eccentric ways, frowned at his bias in important appointments and did not hold back their feelings about the forgotten promises, such as 30% reservation for women.

Juxtaposing the stories of the two neighbouring states, quite evidently there exists a common theme. Both MGR (and consequently Jayalalitha) and NTR had serious social and political agenda, and not mere stardom, that helped them rise and grow in politics. Both the (AIA)DMK and the TDP played the identity politics card, and timed their moves rather well. They used cultural nationalism as an ideology for mass mobilisation and articulation of political demands. And at a time (the 1970s and early 1980s) when there was growing discontent among the masses in most states against the ruling Congress party on accounts of corruption, unemployment and general anti-incumbency, this politics of identitarianism resonated wonderfully well with the electorate!

So, clearly electing movie stars as chief ministers had little to do with the lack of political acumen among the masses. Yes, their stardom meant that they had an established fan base among the masses that probably guaranteed a few sycophantic votes. But most people, including their fans, were voting more for their political and social agenda rather than their stardom.

And personally I feel this is exactly what should be Rajinikanth's primary consideration, if it already isn't, before he decides to take the plunge. Does he have a robust socio-political agenda that he can campaign for? One that is in line with the asks of the modern Tamil voter? One that the public will instantly connect with? Or maybe, now that Amma is no more and Karunanidhi's sons Stalin and Azhagiri are too busy infighting post their father's demise, does he see a general void in leadership in the state that he wants to step into? The challenge is to transcend from being an actor-politician to just a politician by showcasing dedication and hard work to win people's trust. Is Thalaivaa up for it?

One last discussion before I end this blogathon. Given the popularity of films and actors in our country, why could movie stars in other Indian states not do an MGR or an NTR? Especially with the Congress party fast losing people's support in almost every part of the nation in the 1970s and 1980s? Surely at least someone as larger-than-life as Amitabh Bachchan was as big a star across the Hindi speaking belt, if not bigger, as MGR or NTR?

Well, for that to happen, as we've seen already, a very strong sense of distinct identity or shared history with the star is absolutely imperative. Big B may have, and am sure he does have, millions of fans in Bihar and Madhya Pradesh, but it is tough for them to emotionally connect with him and look up to him as their political leader! Because he just isn't one of them! Similarly for someone in Allahabad, his place of birth, Bachchan is still probably an outsider since he's lived almost all his life in Mumbai. Even then, he still did win the only election he contested, from Allahabad in 1984, by a massive margin, but soon resigned after he was implicated in the Bofors Scandal by a newspaper, never to return again!

Among the other states, Gujarat and Orissa hardly have film industries of note and the Marathi film industry has long been completely overshadowed by Bollywood. West Bengal probably was our best bet to become another TN. Immense self pride, a desire for egalitarian society and a strong sense of history, the state met all the prerequisites. But just as the Dravidian parties did in the south, communists filled up the vacuum in WB. Even then, had megastar Uttam Kumar chosen to be the face of the non-Congress group, WB too could have had its own film star CM!

Similar to WB, the Akali Dal moved into power in Punjab, almost at the same time. And Kerala, another southern state with a strong film industry, had long been ardent admirers of the communists, voting them to power as early as 1957 (the first ever elected communist government in the world!!), so the likes of Sathyan, M.G. Soman or Mammootty never stood a chance!

The only other Dravidian state, Karnataka, also had a larger-than-life hero in Dr. Rajkumar. But throughout his life he maintained a safe distance from the power game, thus “depriving” the Kannadigas of a film star CM!

Only time will tell how Thalaivaa fares in his political journey, if at all he decides to enter the ring. He will do well to go in with a well thought-out agenda. More importantly, he needs to time his move well. To borrow a dialogue from his 1995 hit Muthu - "No one can tell when or how I'll arrive, but when the time is right, I will be there"!

Hope the dialogue doesn't backfire!

#politics