“Narendra Damodara Das Modiji.” “Stalin uncle. It is very wrong, uncle.” With an idea to anger and provoke the DMK cadres and the BJP supporters, actor and Tamilaga Vettri Kazhagam leader Vijay, on Thursday, tried to position himself as the primary force to fight the ruling DMK and the BJP.
The second TVK conference at Paparathi in Madurai, titled ‘History of Victory Returns, Tamil Nadu in a March of Triumph’ saw a huge crowd - over three lakh people, mostly youngsters. Shouting slogans, praising Vijay, and breaking into celebrations as they walked into the conference venue, the crowd was a mix of party cadres, Vijay’s fans, men, women, and young girls, walking for more than 10 kilometres on the Madurai-Thoothukudi highway to get just a glimpse of Vijay. A new song was released during the second conference, calling Vijay a people’s man.
Stalin uncle, what uncle very wrong uncle 😹😹🔥🔥#TVKVettriMaanadupic.twitter.com/N6cOdxthcL
— Arun Vijay (@AVinthehousee) August 21, 2025
In his 35-minute-long speech, Vijay sounded energetic while embracing former chief ministers C.N. Annadurai and M.G. Ramachandran. Celebrated as the Dravidian icons of Tamil Nadu, Annadurai and MGR rewrote history when they overthrew the existing strong governments. While Annadurai toppled the Congress government led by Kamaraj in 1967, MGR overthrew the DMK government led by M. Karunanidhi. Vijay, off late, has been consistently maintaining that his party will create history like in 1967 and 1977. During the speech, he invoked the name of MGR multiple times, with the intention to pull the disillusioned AIADMK cadres to his side. “A party founded by MGR. You know how it is now. The cadres are worried,” Vijay said
In Tamil Nadu, MGR had always been an icon, and any actor getting into politics always wanted to do an MGR. In fact, no actor in Tamil Nadu, in the past four decades, was able to reproduce MGR. Though Jayalalithaa claimed MGR's legacy and led the party to power after him, she could not match his enduring political image. And be it Vijayakanth or Kamal Hassan, or Sarath Kumar, even when their parties had a huge support, they could not repeat history like MGR. With over 250 films on the silver screen, MGR was an unshaken icon and commanded a huge public support.
Vijay’s screen presence in terms of number of films is not even 50 percent of MGR's. But the aura and the mass support for him from the grassroots level, particularly the young voters, seem to have helped Vijay bet for the long haul in politics. The second conference in Madurai had apparently helped Vijay consolidate his support base and helped him position himself against the ruling DMK in the state and the BJP in the centre.
In fact, Vijay’s idea of embracing Anna and MGR and his speech in the conference against the DMK was to consolidate the anti-DMK and the anti-BJP votes in his favour.
