Coimbatore: The Coimbatore (South) Assembly constituency has gained the limelight with Tamil film actor-turned-politician Kamal Haasan’s maiden attempt to enter the Legislative Assembly in the elections scheduled for April 6, 2021.
The air in the constituency is thick with the anxious question: Will the star value give him the power to dwarf his political challengers?
Coimbatore South constituency has 2,52,389 voters and includes north Indians, Hindus, Christians and Muslims.
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On behalf of the BJP in the AIADMK alliance, Vanathi Srinivasan is the candidate in the constituency, trying her luck for the second time. In the 2016 Assembly elections, she contested from the same constituency on behalf of the BJP and secured 33,113 votes.
She hopes to emerge victorious by allying with the AIADMK. But recent incidents have dampened the spirit of the alliance.
As the AIADMK has allotted the seat to BJP, the sitting AIADMK MLA Amman Arjunan is upset and a section of the party men staged an agitation to the great discomfort of the party high command. However, the dissenters were pacified at conciliatory talks and directed to support and work for the victory of the BJP candidate.
Sources said the AIADMK activists, though seemingly silent after the party high command’s strong directive, cannot be expected to work wholeheartedly for the victory of the BJP in the Assembly elections. According to the grapevine, most of the ruling party volunteers have decided to support Kamal Haasan which puts him in a key position.
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Reacting to these developments, Vanathi Srinivasan said, “I gained the people’s support during the last elections. Consequently, for the past five years, I have been ensuring that the people in Coimbatore (South) are getting the benefits of the Central government schemes. Hence, I have earned the goodwill and support of the voters. So, I will win the elections for sure.”
Continuing her arguments, she added, “I don’t fear my rival candidate Kamal Haasan. Being a well-known actor who has earned accolades for his histrionic skill, he quite naturally is a crowd-puller. After the elections, he will go back to Chennai and will turn his back on the voters here. Whereas I will stay on here and take all measures for the welfare of the people.”
As for the candidate Mayura Jayakumar contesting from the Congress as part of the DMK-Congress alliance, he came second in the 2016 Assembly elections in the same Coimbatore (South) constituency. While he banks on or pins hopes on the anti-incumbency factor against the ruling AIADMK and on the strong alliance with the DMK, the presence of the tinsel town hero and MNM leader Kamal Haasan’s as a contender in the fray seems to make him a little jittery.
Despite negative features, Mayura Jayakumar exudes hope that he will win the election, riding the crest of the people’s anger against the BJP-led Central government with which the voters are not happy for introducing some schemes.
He said, “During the corona lockdown period, I provided welfare assistance to the people here. I have a very clean conscience. People will support me. My victory will be surely a cakewalk. Whereas Kamal, if by some quirk of fate, becomes an MLA, he will go back to Chennai. I belong to this area and will not go anywhere. So, nobody or nothing can make a dent in my victory prospects.”
As for the Makkal Needhi Maiyam, its star candidate Kamal Hassan seems to be facing bright prospects, going by the fact that during the 2019 parliamentary elections, it was only in Coimbatore (South) that his party recorded the highest number of votes in the whole of Tamil Nadu (1,44,829). According to political analysts, it was this fact that drove the ace actor to choose this constituency to try his electoral luck.
Other factors at work seem to have the potential of tilting the scales in favour of Kamal Haasan. Among them are the discontent simmering in the AIADMK rank-and-file over allocation of the seat to the BJP. This could split the AIADMK’s traditional vote bank owing to the presence of the other contenders – TTV Dhinakaran’s Amma Makkal Munnetra Kazhagam and Seeman’s Naam Tamilar Katchi.
The question doing the rounds in Coimbatore (South) now is: Can Kamal replicate his celluloid success in electoral politics, a terrain which his companion and fellow actor of repute have shied away from? Probably he will walk down the path successfully where Rajinikanth feared to tread.
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