By Sharanya Gopinathan
I really like Tamil Nadu politics. From far. It’s only gotten more exciting with age, I think, and I’m quite enjoying this new spate of murder accusations, forced seclusion and meditation camps on the beach.
Yesterday, O. Panneerselvam’s faction of the AIADMK, known as AIADMK (Puratchi Thalaivi Amma), took out a rally in RK Nagar. Which sounds fair enough, until you find out that this wasn’t a regular rally: in fact, I haven’t heard of anything like it happening ever before. They took out a fake coffin with a replica of Former Tamil Nadu Chief Minister J. Jayalalithaa’s body in it dressed exactly the way she was during her actual last rites, complete with an Indian flag wrapping the coffin, and proceeded to parade the fake coffin and body through the streets. I can only imagine what people passing by the area thought was happening.
The Hindustan Times reports that former Education Minister M. Pandiarajan, who was photographed standing next to the head of the coffin with folded hands, had initially objected to the ploy. You’d think that would be hard to believe, seeing as how he’s standing right there, but if you look closely at his expression, you do get the feeling that he’s wishing he was anywhere where this wasn’t happening right now. I like how so many news houses have reported it as a new low, because god, there have just been so many lows.