Last Sunday Tamil film star Vijay – popularly known as Ilaya Thalapathi – made his grand entry into Tamil Nadu politics. Though he formed his party Tamilaga Vetri Kazhagam (TVK) in February this year, the Election Commission gave its formal recognition in September.
Last Sunday was the first part convention in Vikravandi where Vijay, in a grand show, gave his first speech to his supporters. Though his speech has since been endlessly dissected, it is still interesting to parse through what he said and more importantly what he left unsaid.
In a crucial act to distance himself from both the ruling party DMK and the BJP, he called the former his ‘political enemy’ and the latter his ‘ideological enemy’. He was critical of the DMK’s “corruption” promising clean governance and berated the BJP for its “sectarian” politics.
As far his ideology goes he left things ambiguous, perhaps deliberately. The iconography at the Vikravandi convention was interesting – there were huge murals of Periyar, Ambedkar, Velu Rani Nachiyar and Anjalai Ammal (freedom fighters).
Ideological choices
Vijay was also very eclectic in his ideological choices, choosing freely from Periyar’s women’s empowerment and social justice (while rejecting his atheism), Ambedkar’s equality, Kamaraj’s secular principles and Annadurai’s (Anna) ‘One God, one humanity’ (monothiestic) principles.
He was careful in not criticising the AIADMK, perhaps hinting at a future electoral tie up, which is evident from the AIADMK strictly forbidding its cadres from criticising TVK.
The DMK and its allies were not just critical of the TVK but also dismissive of it, calling it BJP’s ‘c-team’.
But the BJP welcomed Vijay’s entry cautiously, keeping the door open for an electoral alliance.
Cinema and Tamil Nadu politics have been closely intertwined for more than seven decades. Despite a host of film stars entering politics, only MG Ramachandran and J Jayalalithaa could become chief ministers. So Vijay’s path to the CM’s seat is an incredibly arduous one.
But with his entry, the 2026 TN Assembly elections just got spicier.