Vijay unveils TVK action plan for Tamil Nadu at maiden conference

CHENNAI: Tamilaga Vettri Kazhagam's maiden conference on Sunday has answered many of the questions thrown at actor Vijay, ever since he announced his political foray.

Clad in his signature style untucked shirt with rolled up sleeves, cotton trousers and slippers, Vijay elucidated TVK's ideological stand, pin-pointed his party's opponents and revealed his political strategy of stitching an alliance and giving a share in power to allies.

That he would position himself against the BJP was expected given his remarks against NEET and CAA. But what came as a surprise was his hard-hitting criticism of DMK, albeit without naming the ruling party.

"Oozhal kabadadharigal'' (corrupt con artists), he said once referring to "those governing Tamil Nadu". They dupe people in the name of Dravidian model govt and they go about scaremongering minorities, he said. In calling Periyar E V Ramasamy as TVK's ideological mentor and quoting DMK founder C N Annadurai's ‘ondre kulam, oruvane devan', Vijay sought to send out the message that today's DMK was far from what the party's icons envisioned. Vijay has sought to position himself as a political opponent of the ruling party even as he wooed anti-BJP votes which DMK banks on.

The conference has also revealed more than what was stated that Vijay can deliver power-packed political speeches and that TVK has organisational abilities and that the speech though extempore was carefully crafted. Political analysts say Vijay was drawing parallels with AIADMK founder M G Ramachandran and Telugu Desam Party founder N T Rama Rao by referring to the ridicule they faced during their political foray.

The optics too sent out subtle yet significant messages. One of the four functionaries on stage was a woman and she happened to be a Muslim. There was another speaker, again a woman, who was a Christian. Then came the gifts presented to Vijay, which were books on the Constitution, Bhagavad Gita, Quran and Bible. If the ramp walk and his jog back to the stage energised cadres, his warm hugs with father S A Chandrasekar and mother Shoba before his speech added an element of melodrama.

Nevertheless, the speech had left a few unanswered questions as well. In the entire speech, he chose not to mention AIADMK, the second largest party in the state. In leaving out AIADMK, Vijay has set off speculations if he was reaching out to AIADMK too for an alliance.

In that case, the next question was whether AIADMK would agree to be a junior partner since Vijay has indicated that he would be the alliance leader. If that was not the case, then the omission of reference to AIADMK is seen as an indication of Vijay's aspiration to position himself as the principal rival of DMK.

The speech did set off ripples. If DMK handles on social media started attacking Vijay within minutes after the speech was over, BJP welcomed it, but for certain parts such as two language policy and opposition to NEET. Seeman said Vijay's ideology doesn't align with that of NTK. Some like Puthiya Tamilagam president K Krishnaswamy lavishly praised Vijay, hinting at the trajectory TN politics might go in the coming days.