Yesterday Cho Ramaswamy has met Rajinikanth and the grapevine is that he is out to convince him to support the AIADMK combine.
That it needs someone to convince or persuade Rajinikanth, to voice his opinion against the DMK is a dot on the integrity and sense of responsibility of Rajinikanth.
Any person with concern for democratic values and good governance will find it irresistible to keep quiet at this juncture in Tamilnadu. It is obvious that corruption has made the DMK and the Congress to stick together for the upcoming elections. It is also obvious that large-scale scale rigging and malpractices are going to happen with these two parties on the same side. Why should the Congress keep insisting on the poll pact that they want, if they are not so sure of winning by crook? The EVMs are a suspect and with the Congress in the mood that it is now, I am worried that we are going to witness the most unfair election this time.
When every right thinking citizen is concerned about such brazen violations of the norms of free and fair elections, here is the “Super Star’ who is reported to be out of station for a month during the polls. This is akin to running away from the responsibility.
Had he remained out of focus from politics all these years, no one would have expected him to be ‘responsible’ now.
But having spoken against a bad regime in the past, he is expected to speak against the regime that he supported then for what it has done to the people and the nation.
He must speak up.
-jayasree
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March 12: Superstar Rajinikanth held `secret' consultations with wellknown political analyst and Tughlak editor Cho S.Ramaswamy at his Poes Garden
Even as the poll heat picked up amid much squabbling between the various allies and also within individual parties for seats and constituencies, Cho drove to Rajini's house in the morning and held talks for about an hour, over fruit juice offered by his good old friend. The two `discussed the prevailing political scene', says a source.
After the meeting, the two friends left in Cho's car to an unknown destination.
There was no other person in the car as Cho himself drove the vehicle. "We do not know where the two had gone. It does not seem that they went to see Jayalalithaa living close by," said the source.
Cho was unwilling to come out with a direct answer when asked if he had discussed the coming elec tions with Mr Rajinikanth and if the latter agreed to support the AIADMK. "I cannot say anything at present," he said. Cho had played a pivotal role in the forging of poll ties between Vijayakanth and Ms Jayalalithaa, despite their oft-professed dislike for each other. After three or four rounds of talks with the DMDK chief, he managed to get the mercurial movie star around to settle for the 41 seats that the AIADMK leader offered. It remains to be seen whether Cho would be able to repeat his `coup' with the superstar now.
