How Vijay glided effortlessly from Kodambakkam to Fort St George

It was the morning of Monday, May 4. A young college student sitting next to me in a ‘share auto’ was watching the Tamil Nadu Assembly election results avidly — quite like a T20 cricket match.

For young people in Tamil Nadu today, politics is enthralling. The state has always been known for its dynamic democratic beliefs, comparable with Ancient Greece, the United States, and parts of Europe. This, perhaps, is behind the catapulting of C Joseph Vijay from Kodambakkam, the Kollywood hub, to Fort St George, the seat of political power.

Vijay’s Tamilaga Vettri Kazhagam (TVK) has polled 17.22 million votes, 34.92 per cent of the total votes cast, against the DMK's 11.92 million votes and 24.19 per cent vote share, respectively. In his very first electoral outing, Vijay has won 108 of the 234 seats in the Tamil Nadu Assembly and is set to form the government soon with support from the Congress and other parties.

Brick by brick

Political commentators are still coming to terms with the verdict. The TVK is just two years old, but Vijay is by no means as young a politician. In 2009, he converted his fan clubs into a people’s movement, called Vijay Makkal Iyakkam, at a rally in Pudukottai, in central Tamil Nadu. It has been a grassroots movement since inception, carrying out various welfare activities.

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In his films, Vijay continued to sing duets and bash up villains, but the underlying political thread was unmistakable. He built a reputation for representing people’s issues, such as untouchability, corruption, drugs, terrorism and so on, in his films. Some of his films, like Sarkar, Mersal, Master, and the latest (unreleased) Jana Nayagan, are downright political.

Roos Gerritsen, author of Fandom on Display, who studied the phenomenon of film fandom in Tamil Nadu, says people develop an intimacy with film stars via repeated viewing of photos and stories. It’s surely true in Vijay’s case.

And, when the time came to vote, a large section of women, youth, and the underprivileged chose that intimate relationship over the Dravidian parties’ narratives of social justice, federalism, and the fear of fascism. The instant connection with the actor worked well for the TVK.

Mass appeal

When Vijay, during one of his very few election rallies, asked children to thus urge their parents to vote for him, it invited legal trouble. The organisation Child Rights Watch filed a complaint saying Vijay and the TVK emotionally exploited children for votes. However, the gambit seems to have paid rich dividends.

“My daughter is 12 years old. She has never asked me for anything big. Her only appeal was that I vote for Vijay. I voted for the TVK’s Whistle symbol. Over 30 of my friends too voted for Vijay because my daughter requested them as well,” T Saira Banu, a woman taxi driver in Chennai, told The Federal.

Saira Banu feels the BJP spells disaster for Tamil Nadu. “Vijay has clearly stated that his ideological enemy is the BJP. That has given us hope,” she said.

Social media also appears to have played a major role in Vijay’s win. “Access to information through social networks is a defining factor,” Aranganathan, a media expert in Krishnagiri, told The Federal.

Oneness with film stars

Vijay Kavyan, a Chennai-based taxi driver, was a first-time voter. He made a trip to his village near Tiruvannamalai to vote for the TVK. “I don’t know the name of the TVK candidate. I rushed there, voted for the Whistle symbol, and rushed back to Chennai for work,” he told The Federal. He is among the 1.4 million first-time voters in Tamil Nadu.

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I was in Katpadi constituency, 141 km away from Chennai, three days after the election. A random sampling signalled huge support for Vijay, largely due to his stardom.

As Roos Gerritsen says, people seem to feel powerful when they feel a connection to a superstar. “The screen image of a hero fighting injustice blurred with his public life as a politician. This convinces audiences of the sincerity of the person and augments his celebrity status,” she wrote in her book.

Perfect ground

If Vijay built his political persona on his stardom, incumbent Chief Minister MK created the perfect conditions for his arrival. Stalin presented Tamil Nadu as a unique cultural sphere where the Union government, or NDA that rules it, would have little say.

Tamil Nadu registered around 11 per cent GDP growth in the last two years of Stalin’s regime while the national average was 7.5 per cent. The DMK supremo gave the hope that Tamil Nadu has the potential to grow manifold despite repeated fracas with the Union government over the disbursal of central funds.

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Vijay presented himself as a hero who could augment the state's wealth as a better administrator. He replicated the electoral promises of the DMK, such as free bus travel for women and education funds.

Stalin focused on education, health, and development. His son and Deputy CM Udhayanidhi Stalin sought to develop sporting infrastructure as the Sports Minister. Vijay touched upon development with his manifesto, but expended his campaign energy on appealing to the voter at an emotional level.

Vijay here, Vijay there

He himself contested from two seats, and disbursed most of the remaining 232 seats to ordinary men and women. Most of them had very little funding to campaign with. His fan Vijay Damu in Royapuram (Chennai) contested and won. For his election campaign, he used his only high-value property — the auto rickshaw he drove.

The candidates were unknown faces, but it didn’t matter to Vijay’s fans. They went for the Whistle symbol in any case. As Vijay thundered at a rally, “Wherever you vote, the candidate is me.”

The electorate agreed. Wholeheartedly.