A month ago, when superstar Rajinikanth flexed his muscles in new Darbar look, it offered his ardent fans a kind of Déjà vu. The 68-year-old actor showed off his arms in a vest and it was like a new avatar that his fans would crave to watch. And, director A.R. Murugadoss tweeted, “Younger, smarter, wiser, tougher… Thalaivar in a never seen before avatar.”
Darbar is Rajinikanth’s next big film in which the superstar is said to be in complete action. In the new poster, the actor, with his arms toned and his eyes smouldering in anger, is seen preparing to throw the barbell and apparently getting ready to fight for the good of the people.
Two weeks after Darbar’s second look stunned his fans, the news of Rajinikanth getting ready to launch his own 'darbar' is doing the rounds. Yes, Rajinikanth’s real life political 'darbar' is all set to begin in 2020, at least eight months before the assembly polls in Tamil Nadu due in 2021.
“He will fill the leadership vacuum created by the demise of Jayalalithaa and Karunanidhi in Tamil Nadu. He will soon launch his own political party. It could be a few months before the elections. His Rajini Makkal Mandram (RMM) is slowly being built up from the grassroot level. He will be a challenge to both the AIADMK and the DMK once he launches his party,” Karate Thiayagaran, former deputy mayor of Chennai and an expelled Congress member, told THE WEEK.
Thiayagarajan, who is considered a loyalist of senior Congress leader P. Chidambaram, has been throwing his weight behind Rajinikanth for quite sometime. Thiyagarajan’s comments came after actor-politician Chiranjeevi, in an interview to a Tamil magazine, advised both Rajinikanth and Kamal Haasan to stay away from politics, as “politics is all about money and even if someone wants to do good for the people, he won’t be able to achieve it.”
Thiyagarajan, during a media interaction, explained how Chiranjeevi’s opinion would not go well with Tamil Nadu politics as “Rajinikanth is not just an actor, but a determined personality who is slowly working towards what he has promised”.
Rajinikanth expressed his political ambitions strongly on December 31, 2017, during an interaction with his fans. Sources close to the actor said that he would launch his party during a massive public rally in Madurai next year and will take on both the AIADMK and the DMK in the 2021 assembly polls. Sources also said that Rajinikanth may be like a magnet for all the disgruntled elements in both the AIADMK and the DMK when he launches his political party.
In fact, his limited interactions with the media recently have been a point of discussion among the right-wing supporters in the state. Be it on the Thoothukudi killings or praising Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Home Minister Amit Shah for scrapping Article 370—he had equated Modi and Shah to Arjuna and Krishna— or insisting the need for a common language in India, Rajinikanth’s views churned controversies, though they have created a palpable excitement among his fans.
While political observers in the state still look at Rajinikanth as a non-starter, his RMM is taking shape to become a strong political variant of his fan clubs. RMM’s membership drive has been progressing steadily at the grassroot level.
“He spoke about spiritual politics which has shaken both the Dravidian parties in the state. This is why MDMK leader Vaiko recently spoke at a public conference about visiting temples and Hindu culture,” said Thiyagarajan.
However, Rajinikanth’s dilemma to take the political plunge continues as he cannot afford a defeat in electoral politics.
