Image Source: Huffington Post
Hero worshipping in Tamilnadu has reached a different level
Recently, the incumbent chief minister of Tamilnadu Ms Jayalalithaa (Amma as she is fondly called) celebrated her birthday and her party’s passionate cadre’s took the celebrations to a whole new low. Many of the ADMK cadre’s were tattooed with Ms Jayalalithaa’s picture. Some have reportedly been forced to do the same as the video suggests. Politics is changing without a doubt, sometimes for the better and a lot of times for the worse. Tamilnadu, for example, has a long history of hero worshipping. So often it is forgotten that cadre’s are the masters of the leaders, it is they who empower them and it is they who choose them. Every time you saw symbolism take over substance, there always raised a question, how much worse it could get?
Past instances
1.) Sticking of Amma’s posters on relief materials gathered by private individuals during the Chennai floods
2.) Huge banners erected right in front people’s house
3.) People who have ended their lives for their leader’s sake during her incarceration in Karnataka
The Logical Indian requests the government of Tamilnadu to take appropriate action to anyone who had been forcefully tattooed. We also ask the authorities to review the whole tattooing exercise and see if adequate safety measures were taken given the health risks involved in the tattooing exercise. We also request people from across political affiliations to denounce hero worshipping. Hero worshipping, as history suggests has never strengthened any democracy, on the contrary, it nurtures autocracy.
