Sasikala, A Jayalalitha or A Janaki Redux?

Sasikala, a Jayalalitha or a Janaki redux? That’s a million-dollar question for the post-Amma party.

- Kavitha Muralidharan

A day before Cyclone Vardha left Chennai devastated, Tamil Nadu’s political climate had been stupefied by an interesting development—the stunning immediacy with which frontline leaders of the AIAD- MK flamboyantly queued up at Poes Garden, requesting V.K. Sasikala to take over the party’s mantle. Perhaps it was not all that unexpected, given how the new cabinet took over within two hours of J. Jayalalitha’s death. Sasikala and her family are said to be behind the smooth transition of power. It had taken 48 hours for a new cabinet to be ushered in when Jayalalitha was convicted by a Bangalore special court in the Disproportionate Assets case in 2014. Interestingly, if the ministers had flaunted Jayalalitha’s photographs in their shirt pockets and shed copious tears when taking oath then, such demonstration of loyalty was conspicuously missing this time.

The narrative that is perhaps consciously built by Sasikala is unmistakable. In making the party accept her leadership without asking any questions, Sasikala is as impeccable as Jayalalitha was, if not more. Images of party seniors standing in front of her with folded hands as if urging her to don the role of saviour are being released to the media every day.