What seemed to be a neck-to-neck fight, ended up in defeat for famed actor and founder of Makkal Needhi Maiam (MNM) Kamal Haasan in Tamil Nadu’s state assembly elections.

The actor who made his electoral debut with 2021 state assembly elections was expected by many to contest from Chennai but instead, he chose Coimbatore (South) as his constituency. He lost to BJP’s popular leader Vanathi Srinivasan.

Kamal Haasan's political gamble couldn't pay off one more time. The Makkal Needhi Maiyam (MNM) was leading in only one seat, Coimbatore South, where Haasan himself is the candidate. However, by the end of the counting, that was lost too. 

Kamal Haasan suffered a major setback, as he got 51,087 votes where as Srinivasan secured 52,627 votes, bagging a victory by 1,540 votes in the Tamil Nadu Assembly Elections.

Kamal Haasan was welcomed and responded well by the people in Coimbatore South seat, but he could leave only his actor image there. The poor performance in the 2019 Lok Sabha elections and not being able to save even one's own seat means that people are still looking at Kamal Haasan as actor. He could not leave the mark of the leader.

Kamal Haasan in a Tweet thanked his supporters and said that he accepts the verdict of the people.

BJP leader and winner Vanathi Srinivasan also took to Twitter to thank her voters and supporters. Her Tweet read, “We have won! Thank you Kovai South for your support & blessings. I bow down to my voters, to my leaders, PM @narendramodi ji, HM @AmitShah ji, Nat’l President @JPNadda ji, GS(O) @blsanthosh ji & all @BJP4TamilNadu karyakarta for their hard work & dedication.”

While Vanathi Srinivasan has been a popular figure in Coimbatore mainly for maintaining a distance from identity based politics, her opponent Kamal Haasan based his entire campaign on anti-Hindu and anti-Hindi narrative.

From regarding the national language Hindi as a ‘little child in diapers’ in comparison with older languages of the country to dismissing the existence of the word ‘Hindu‘ before Mughals, Haasan found himself in many such controversies just before the state elections.

Vanathi Srinivasan, the 50-year old BJP leader and Chennai High Court lawyer, was in a closely-contested fight with Kamal Haasan.

References:

OpIndia