The 2016 Tamil Nadu Assembly election marks the complete transformation of MK Stalin, the 63-year-old president of the youth wing of the DMK, who is also the treasurer of the party. Gone are the days when Stalin made his appearance in pearl white dhoti and shirt. The ‘youthful’ leader of the DMK wears designer shirts and trousers carefully chosen by son-in-law Sabarish Vedamurthy, an IT entrepreneur.
Sabari, as Sabarish is known, is the man behind the makeover of Stalin, who is addressed as Thalapathi (Tamil for commander) by the DMK cadre. In the past he never side-stepped or over stepped M Karunanidhi, his illustrious father, to make statements or announcements. But the 2016 campaign is seeing an entirely different Stalin. The run up to the Assembly election saw Stalin undertaking “Namukku Naame” (We for Ourselves) journey covering all 234 constituencies in Tamil Nadu.
Stalin, who was seen even during the 2014 lok Sabha election as reserved, withdrawn and often wavering while addressing public meetings, was a contrast during the Namukku Naame journey. Much to the surprise of the people of Tamil Nadu, Stalin mingled and interacted with common man as well as woman.
Much to the shock of the conservative Dravidians in his party, Stalin made a startling declaration: “The DMK is a part of the Hindus. There is a well-planned move to project the DMK as an anti-Hindu party. Family members of party leaders and cadre have faith in the God. My wife Durga visits all temples in the State and I never ask her not to do so,” Stalin declared while launching his Namukku Naame journey from Kanyakumari.
This is in stark contrast to what party founder C N Annadurai wrote in 1942. “The Hindu religion does not belong to Tamil Nadu. It is an alien language and we Tamil do not have anything to do with that religion,” Annadurai has written. Even Karunanidhi. Stalin’s nonagenarian father had declared that Hindus were thieves. The DMK president has been hauled to the court for the comment and he was intelligent enough to tell the court that what he meant was that the Hindus were robbers of hearts!
Though he had been in the shadows of Karunanidhi since his induction into the party in 1971, Stalin has come out of that stage in the 2016 election. Even as Karunanidhi is being projected as the Chief Ministerial candidate of the DMK, it is an open secret that Stalin would be the Chief Minister in the eventuality of the DMK win. Most of the party candidates who have been fielded in this election were handpicked by Stalin, wife Durga and son-in-law Sabari.
With Alagiri, elder son of Karunanidhi and a powerful challenger, ousted from the party, the DMK is fully under the grip of Stalin. All district secretaries of the party owe their allegiance to him. In television commercials aired by various news channels, Stalin speaks about the comprehensive DMK manifesto. “If the party manifesto of 2006 was the hero of that election, the 2016 manifesto is the super hero,” says Stalin.
In election rallies, he sings with the audience even as he speaks with confidence and articulation about the changes which he hopes to usher in. But he still wavers when the name Jayalalithaa crops in and it is the biggest challenge he has to surmount, pointed out many observers. Jayalalithaa is the Serena Williams of Tamil Nadu politics while Stalin continues to be the leander Paes. As the de-facto leader of the DMK in this election, Stalin’s task is to bring the party back from oblivion to the victory podium.