Chennai: The Kamal show at Nehru Stadium on Sunday threw up an interesting combo of ‘yesterday-today-tomorrow’ of celluloid ambition for the political crown.
Having already launched his Makkal Needhi Maiam (MNM), Kamal represented ‘yesterday’ while Rajinikanth can get away with the ‘today’ tag since he has been hanging on the precipice of an ‘epochal’ announcement of political launch.
‘Tomorrow’ could prepare the political space scripted by another superstar Vijay’s ambitious dad, SA Chandrasekar, when he told the audience that Kamal and Rajini should come together for delivering a great government and also, keep way for their thambis — which could mean his son who has already made some significant political sounds in and off cinema.
"All this shows the Tamil society is obsessed with cinema and film stars. They seem to have settled down to accepting only a film star as their Chief Minister. There is scary bankruptcy of political maturity here", said an ex-MP, requesting anonymity.
Dr Gladstone Xavier, who heads the Sociology Department at the prestigious Loyola College in Chennai, feels that this rallying behind film stars "has been the trend here as people have lost their imagination to think afresh". Also, the failure of the politicians of today is encouraging the search for alternatives, as the existing order "have not given new leadership, only dynasty politics or movie stars". These fans and public fail to differential the larger-than-life leadership on screen from the real life requirements, said the professor.
"It is pitiable that even after so many years of rational thinking promoted by social movements, we still rally behind these movie stars with the hope of deliverance from social evils and looking for good governance", said Dr Xavier.
He said it was not wrong for a movie star to aspire to lead the state but then, that person should have had considerable interaction with the common man and exhibited concern towards public sufferings, besides delivering potent solutions. It would be wrong to parachute from the mega screen life on to the CM chair at Fort St.George.
