By Sushil Kutty
It did not take long for actor-politician Kamal Haasan to reveal his true colours. It isn’t ‘saffron’, though. ‘Kamal Saar’ is a time-tested disruptor. He is grateful to Tamil Nadu Deputy Chief Minister Udhayanidhi Stalin for the Rajya Sabha seat and whose thoughts on ‘Sanatan Dharma’ is legend: Malaria, dengue, leprosy, AIDS, HIV… Covid-19?
Udhayanidhi wants Sanatan Dharma/Hinduism” eradicated”. Haasan wants the “shackles” of Sanatan Dharma broken. The Rajya Sabha seat has emboldened Kamal and he couldn’t wait to thank Udhayanidhi Stalin and Chief Minister MK Stalin enough. Without DMK, Kamal Haasan would not have rated the “elder” tag.
Haasan is a thespian and an accomplished actor though nowhere near Rajnikant in popularity. Haasan is also nowhere in the league of Vijay Joseph as a budding politician. Kamal Haasan has his own political party but he remains a budding politician! Vijay also has a political party but with a difference. His budding days are already over.
And Kamal Haasan is still not out of ‘Ek Dujhe Ke Liye’. Kamal plays language against language even today. Like he went after Kannada with the inane “Tamil is the mother of Kannada” statement. Some call it Haasan’s hypocrisy. Kamal’s movies depict ‘Hinduism’ as saviour in this big bad world. Kamal Haasan has played the outraged Hindu time and again when he is lost in oxymorons!
Kamal’s eyes, however, strike a shining intelligence. And the booming husky voice only silenced by a silent role in a silent movie! Haasan can snatch words right out of the mouths of babies and who hasn’t heard of ‘bachche man ke sachche’? To millions and millions of Indians, Kamal Haasan is an honest politician with both name and face recognition.
The media finds Kamal Haasan’s opinions palatable. A Michelin-chef would even make a recipe out of them! Kamal Haasan’s last film ‘Tugh Life’ was spurned by the box-office. Most successful Kamal Haasan movies are about making hay till ‘Sanatan Dharma’ lasts!
Kamal Haasan is important because he makes Hindus think. United States President Donald Trump doesn’t think much of Prime Minister Narendra Modi and the least said about Trump’s view on ‘India’s dead economy’.
President Trump resurrected the ‘Hindu growth rate’ in his own lowlife lingo. And Prime Minister Modi didn’t react, except with innuendos at an open air political rally. Why can’t Kamal Haasan give President Trump a verbal hiding instead of trying to run down Sanatan Dharma?
Kamal’s political party Makkal Needhi Maiam (MNM) has found “new energy” after his latest assault on ‘Sanatan Dharma’.
Kamal Haasan is not daft. Nor is he a mischief-monger. The fact that Haasan ran away from school not once but twice is forgotten lore and rumour at their best. But the best thing that happened to Kamal Haasan is that silver-screen discovered him before Eastman Kodak found ‘colour film processing’.
On Sunday, an NGO ‘Agaram Foundation’ hosted Kamal Haasan and the senior actor went straight after NEET. “Education is the only weapon to break the shackles of dictatorship and sanatana dharma. Don’t pick other weapons… Majority morons will defeat, and knowledge will be defeated.”
Nobody batted an eye. Kamal Haasan is a progressive left-liberal. Kamal praised actor Suriya’s education society ‘Agaram Foundation’ for helping students study medicine. “Now can you understand why we oppose NEET? The law has made medical education inaccessible to poor students,” Kamal said. Chameleon, anybody?
Actor and newly-installed BJP state vice-president Khusbhu Sundar called Haasan’s remarks unwarranted. Haasan has a closet full of actor friends. His outburst “education is the only weapon against Sanatan and dictatorship” has become lore now.
Education alone can dismantle “the shackles of dictatorship and Sanatan” is as old as Sanatan Dharma! “Don’t take anything else in your hands, only education. We cannot win without it, because the majority can make you lose. Majority fools (Moodargal) will make you lose; knowledge alone will seem defeated. That’s why we must hold on to it (education) firmly,” Kamal Haasan philosified.
If anybody’s a ‘moodargal’, it is not Kamal Haasan. Kamal is the only actor-politician who knows the difference between ‘Hippocratic oath’ and ‘hypocrite’s oath’. The first is a pledge that holds dear ethical standards that doctors profess. The second is conduct that “contradicts” spoken words. Haasan is a more accomplished actor than a politician. He would have made a far better medical doctor if he had only given education a chance! Instead, he took up acting and then became a politician!
So true, consider this, which Kamal Haasan spoke at the end of his calumny directed against ‘Sanatan Dharma’: “Leadership is that which disappears (with time) into the society and not that (which) stands and rules. It took me 70 years to understand this!” (IPA Service)
