Good governance in Tamil Nadu is only a click away. All you need to do is register your name and voter ID number to become a member on superstar Rajinikanth’s website rajinimandram.org. That’s what the actor unveiled a day after announcing his decision to enter politics.
He said: “In order to bring about good governance in Tamil Nadu, I have started rajinimandram.org page for registered fan clubs, unregistered fan clubs and the people of Tamil Nadu.”
This comes on the back of his speech on December 31, when he said his first priority would be to register all unregistered fan clubs.
“I have several thousand fan clubs, in villages and cities across the state. The unregistered ones are twice as many. We need to get the unregistered clubs registered and unite them. This is an important task and our first task,” he said.
According to an estimate, there are as many as 50,000 unregistered Rajini fan clubs in Tamil Nadu and beyond, as the official Rajinikanth fan club association had stopped registered new members in 1997.
The actor’s first two messages seem to suggest that he is looking to ride to Fort St George, the seat of power in Chennai, on the back of his immense popularity among people.
While there is nothing illegal about a popular star looking to tap into his fan base, there is an inherent difference between a star’s relationship with his fans and a political leader’s relationship with citizens. A fan is awestruck, more in love with the larger-than-life image of the actor than the man in flesh and blood.
He does not ask uncomfortable, searching questions and is more than happy if the star obliges him with a show of trademark mannerisms, a photograph or a handshake. It is an unequal relationship, where the star is elevated to demi-god status with the fan in a state of perennial delirium.
A politician in contrast, would get the approval of a voter only if he conforms to certain norms. A citizen considers his vote precious and would not waste it on just about anyone. The traditional politician is expected to spell out what he will do for the constituency, the state and the country before the citizen agrees to sign up with him.
In sharp contrast, nothing is known about what Rajini’s ideology is, what he plans to do and what his position on different contentious issues is. He made a joke of the fact that a journalist asked him “what are your policies?” But frankly there was nothing funny about it.
Tamil Nadu deserves to know what Rajinikanth, the politician, means. To make people sign up for Rajinikanth, the superstar, would be leading them into a blind alley.
In the last 50-odd years, though two Dravidian parties have always been at the helm of affairs in the state since 1967, to say that the Dravidian ideology defines and drives Tamil Nadu’s politics would be incorrect.
The campus recruitment from Kollywood has meant that over the years, politics in the state has become largely personality-oriented. The personality cult defined Jayalalithaa’s brand of politics, with the former chief minister asking for votes in her name. Her party candidates would stand on tier two of the stage, a level below her, hands folded.
The last one year since Jayalalithaa’s demise has seen many within her party trying to emerge as powerful individuals but in vain. It has proved that it was not AIADMK as a party but Jayalalithaa who ran the show.
Similarly, since DMK patriarch Karunanidhi is no longer politically active due to ill-health, son MK Stalin has been building the DMK around him but he is not the brilliant orator and quick wit his father is. The political vacuum in Tamil Nadu that is being spoken of at this point in time is actually a personality vacuum.
Which is why Rajinikanth’s entry, from his point of view, could not have come at a better time. But the risk Tamil Nadu faces by allowing him to be a pied piper is that “Work is Worship” gets replaced by “Work is Hero Worship”.
Rajinikanth, however, has a good chance of hitting the political jackpot because he comes in at a time where there is widespread disgust with political corruption, after the manner in which the RK Nagar bypoll was conducted. He is also not tainted by any allegations of personal corruption. But then he will be expected to demonstrate how he will be different. Tamil Nadu deserves better than mere homilies about the need for an honest society and good governance.
It is interesting that the logo of his portal as well as the background music of his video message are borrowed from his 2002 film Baba. At that time, it was one of the biggest flops of Rajini’s career, forcing him to return money to his distributors. Usually sequels are made of successful projects but here the imprint of Baba is all over the actor’s political sequel.
Rajinikanth, being Rajinikanth, had to be different.
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