Looking Forward...

December, 31,2020 

8.45 p.m.

We stand at the threshold of another year.

Everything looks hazy and vague to me. New medication for depression keeps me a bit drowsy throughout the day. So what I'm writing now won't be coherent. Still...

The immediate concern for me is to overcome the crisis caused by my job loss. My friends Gopu Mohan & Annie, Ayyappan, Sannidha & Praveen are being of much help. I look forward to freelancing, easier said than done, as an option to cope with the situation.

On Twitter (I have managed to almost withdraw myself from Facebook) friends and followers have been of immense help with their comforting and inspiring words, for instance, Alka Gadgil,  'Jesse' @jershalley, Zahirra Dayal, Not a Bot@Shivang1746428, Surmai, Jeena,  and more. 

My daughter is doing well. She is into her second year English Literature course.

I firmly believe that we should leave it to our women to lead us. Jacinda Ardern (despite the criticisms) has already proved it. Everyone from Ilhan Abdullahi Omar to Greta Thunberg is proving it.

And, it is a necessity for us that the ongoing farmer's struggle in Delhi succeeds.

Wish our comrades languishing in prisons are finally set free...

ENDS.

In Sathankulam, Chicago or Thiruvananthapuram, Police Excesses Continue Unabated.

In Thiruvananthapuram, Sathankulam,  Chicago or anywhere else in the world, the police in uniform to a large extent symbolize injustice. 

The force is widely considered as prejudiced against the underprivileged and the minorities. They are insensitive towards the people as they try to be loyal to the political parties in power.

The three recent incidents, cited below, illustrates that it is already too late for reforms in the police force the world over. 

The custodial death of a trader P.Jeyaraj and his son J.Benniks at Sathankulam in Thoothukudi district of Tamil Nadu in June this year had rocked the nation.

The father-son duo underwent indescribable torture at the hands of the police.

The Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) charge sheet had revealed that Jeyaraj and his son Benniks, turn by turn, were made to bow down on a wooden table, in underwear. Their hands and legs were held by the police personnel, who were accused in the case so that the duo was not able to defend themselves. 

While holding them in that position the father-son duo were subjected to severe beatings with lathi on buttocks, back and other parts of the body. 

Though Jeyaraj begged that he has blood pressure and diabetic condition, the police paid no heed and continued their brutal torture with intervals in between 7.45 pm on June 19 to 3 am on June 20 this year.

During the process of brutal torture, the police officers asked Benniks to clean the blood that had oozed from their wounds and spilt on the floor of the Sattankulam police station with his vest. 

Despite all the torture and wounds, on the morning of June 20, Dr N.Vinila, Medical Officer at a government hospital in Sattankulam declared Jeyaraj and Benniks were  'fit for remand.' The blood-stained clothes of Jeyaraj and his son were changed twice before they were taken to the hospital and the court.

The charge sheet was filed against nine police officers namely, then Sattankulam inspector of police S.Sridhar, sub-inspectors K.Balakrishnan and P.Raghuganesh, head constables S.Murugan and A.Samadurai and four police constables. A sub-inspector of police died during the investigation.

A statement issued by the CBI said that the central agency had registered two cases on July 7, 2020, related to the allegations of custodial death of two traders (father-son  P. Jeyaraj and J. Benniks) in Kovilpatti. A CBI team camped continuously at Madurai and worked untiringly in the cases even though the odds of COVID 19 pandemic.

CBI investigation revealed that the father-son duo was arrested in the evening of June 19 and allegedly tortured at the Sathankulam Police Station by the accused in the evening as well as in the intervening night, consequent to which both of them succumbed to the injuries and died in the intervening night of June 22 & 23.

Lately, in Thiruvananthapuram, in a case of insensitiveness from the part of the police, a couple suffered serious burns and succumbed to their injuries in hospital.

It was on December 22 that Rajan, 47, and his wife Ambili, 40, of Neyyatinkara, resisted the move by the police and revenue officials to evict them from their house citing a court order based on an allegation of encroachment.

Rajan and Ambili drenched themselves in petrol and threatened to immolate themselves if the police proceeded further. Rajan had a lighter in his hand. When the police tried to prevent him from taking the drastic step, the lighter accidentally lit the fire and Rajan and Ambili were set ablaze. Both suffered serious burn injuries and passed away on Monday.

"The heart-wrenching incident got widely noticed across the state after the couple’s children alleged that a police officer was responsible for the immolation. Many including leaders of rival political parties had come out criticising the police," a report in The News Minute says.

The funeral of Ambili, who passed away on Monday, took place on Tuesday night. Rajan who died on Sunday night was buried in the premises of the house. In a video which has gone viral, the couple’s younger son 17-year-old Renjith can be seen lashing out at the police while trying to dig a hole to bury his father. This was before the death of Ambili. In the video, a police officer can be seen asking the boy to stop digging. Renjith points a finger at him and says feelingly, “Only my mother is left. It is all of you that killed my father, now won’t you allow me to bury him,” and continues to dig the grave. Hours after this incident, their mother Ambili also succumbed to the injuries.

Later on Tuesday, Kerala Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan announced that the government will take over protection of the children.

Hundreds Protest Chicago Raid Of Naked Black Woman's Home

According to a report by Jon Greig for the Blavity News, the harrowing video of Chicago police officers mistakenly raiding and rifling through Anjanette Young's home has sparked protests in Chicago on Sunday, with hundreds of Black women showing out to express their outrage about the situation, according to The Chicago Sun-Times.

The women were joined at the Chicago Police headquarters protest by Rev. Jesse Jackson, Lt. Gov. Juliana Stratton, Chicago Treasurer Melissa Conyears-Ervin, as well as Reps. Bobby Rush and Danny Davis. 

“We just wanted to just say, in our outrage and our anger, ‘Hey girl, we with you.’ That’s what we need. Black women...we’ve always been that foundation, that glue for the family. And so to see us all come together and respond to demand fair justice for another sister... that was great, that’s awesome,” said organizer Mary Russell-Gardner in an interview with the Sun-Times.

Exclusive bodycam video from the 2019 raid on Young's home, showed more than seven officers barge into her home heavily armed and screaming, according to footage released by CBS2. Young was in the shower when they broke in. Officers left her handcuffed, naked and dripping wet as the men searched through her things and demanded answers. She was standing naked in front of the men for 15 minutes before a woman officer arrived and took her to her room where she could change.

The officers eventually were forced to apologize because they had the wrong address. The video also showed officers admitting that the warrant may not have gotten official approval from superiors. 

ENDS.

Death Anniversary of Periyar E.V.Ramasamy.

       "No fear, no hate, that's our victory!"

         --Albert Camus.

Kochi, 

December 24, 2020.

பகுத்தறிவு என்பது மனிதனுக்கு உயிர்நாடி என்று தனது கடைசி காலம் வரை முழங்கிய பெரியாரின் 47ஆவது நினைவு தினம் இன்று. 1973ஆம் ஆண்டு 94 வயதில் பெரியார் காலமானார். சமூகத்தில் மிகப்பெரும் மாற்றங்களை நிகழ்த்திய பெரியார் சமகால வாழ்க்கையுடனும், அரசியலுடனும் ஒத்துப் போகிறார் என்பதை மறுப்பதற்கில்லை...

(Puthiya Thalaimurai)

**The Sanyukta Kisan Morcha (SKM) said on Wednesday that it would require a concrete proposal to return to the negotiating table, not a repetition of the amendments that it had already rejected. 

The protesting farmers announced their decision to soldier on for the repeal of the three farm laws, squarely blaming the Narendra Modi dispensation for the continuing stalemate.

(Anita Joshua, The Telegraph).

**Lambasting the DDCA for deciding to install a statue of its late former President Arun Jaitley at the Feroz Shah Kotla ground, spin legend Bishan Singh Bedi has asked the body to remove his name from the spectators' stand, named after him in 2017.

Lashing out at the Delhi and District Cricket Association's (DDCA) culture, which he alleged promotes nepotism and puts "administrators ahead of cricketers", Bedi also renounced his membership of the body.

(The Telegraph).

**The BJP’s central leadership on Wednesday came out all guns blazing to claim victory in the maiden District Development Council elections after winning 74 seats, the highest by any individual party, but the results mask its multiple setbacks including its broader goal of installing a Hindu chief minister in the fledgling Union Territory.(Muzaffar Raina/ The Telegraph).

**Malayalam film director Naranipuzha Shanavas, who suffered a massive heart attack on Tuesday passed away at Aster Medicity on Wednesday.

Eco on Manifesto.

 

23 Dec 2014.

“It is difficult to imagine that a few fine pages can single-handedly change the world. After all, Dante’s entire oeuvre (the body of work) was not enough to restore a Holy Roman Empire to the Italian city-states. But, in commemorating The Communist Manifesto of 1848, a text that certainly has exercised a major influence on the history of two centuries, I believe one must reread it from the point of view of its literary quality, or at least –even if one does not read it in the original German-of its extraordinary rhetorical skill and the structure of its arguments.”

“Even apart from its genuinely poetic capacity to invent memorable metaphors, the Manifesto remains a masterpiece of political (but not only political) oratory, and it ought to be studied at school along with Cicero’s Invectives against Catiline and Mark Antony’s speech over Julius Caesar’s body in Shakespeare, especially as it is not impossible, given Marx’s familiarity with classical culture, that he had in mind these very texts when writing it.”

--Umberto Eco, on literature (On the Style of the Communist Manifesto)

Pollution killed nearly 1.7m people in India in 2019.

          The joy of true quiet becomes a daily healing food.

--Thich Nhat Hanh.

**A special CBI Court in Thiruvananthapuram on Wednesday sentenced to life imprisonment Father Thomas M Kottoor and Sister Sephy, in the Sister Abhaya murder case. (Live Law).

**Poet and activist Sugathakumari passes away.

**As many as 41 Indian sailors are reportedly stuck on a ship MV Anastasia in China because of a trade war with Australia for the past 13 months.

**In view of the new coronavirus strain, Tamil Nadu chief minister Edappadi K.Palaniswami to meet health experts on December 28.

**Pollution accounted for nearly 1.7m premature deaths in India in 2019, or 18% of all deaths, according to a study that lays bare the human cost of the country’s toxic urban air.

A report published by the Lancet says pollution in India has led to an increase in diseases such as lung cancer, heart disease, stroke, diabetes, neonatal disorders and respiratory diseases, resulting in millions more deaths. (Hannah-Ellis Petersen / The Guardian)

**A prominent Turkish journalist has been sentenced in absentia to more than 27 years in jail on terrorism-related charges that his legal team have described as politically motivated.

Can Dündar, who edited Turkey’s Cumhuriyet newspaper before fleeing to Germany in 2016, was previously found guilty by an Istanbul court of espionage and aiding an armed terrorist organisation. (Bethan McKernan/ The Guardian).

**The model Stella Tennant has died aged 50, her family has confirmed.

Her family said in a statement: “It is with great sadness we announce the sudden death of Stella Tennant on 22 December 2020. (PA News / The Guardian)

COVID Perspective

@covidperspectiv

·

6m

BREAKING: A SECOND new variant has been found in the UK that is yet more transmissible.

MORE NEWS.

Kerala Governor denies assent to convene Assembly.

1. Kerala Governor Arif Mohammed Khan denies assent to convene the Assembly on Wednesday to discuss and reject the new Central farm laws.

"The CPM-helmed ruling Left Democratic Front and the Congress-led Opposition United Democratic Front found the governor’s decision a violation of his constitutional obligation to honour a decision taken by the state cabinet and sought his immediate recall," writes K.M.Rakesh in The Telegraph.

"The government had sought the approval of Mr Khan to convene the Assembly to pass a unanimous resolution against the Centre's farm laws. The Governor reportedly questioned the merit of the request," The Hindu reports.

Farmers to decide on govt. offer for talks today.

 டெல்லியில் போராடும் விவசாய அமைப்புகளை புதிய பேச்சுவார்த்தைக்கு மத்திய அரசு அழைத்துள்ளது. இதில் பங்கேற்பது குறித்த முடிவை விவசாய அமைப்புகள் இன்று எடுக்கின்றன -Daily Thanthi.

Abhaya case: Court to pronounce sentence today.

2. A Special CBI Court in Thiruvananthapuram  will pronounce the sentence in the Sister Abhaya case.

The court on Tuesday convicted a catholic priest and a nun in the infamous Sister Abhaya murder case.

Abhaya was only 19 at the time she was murdered in a convent at Kottayam in Kerala. Her parents are no more.

The CB (CID) police of the state who initially probed the case concluded that it was a case of suicide. But the CBI found it was a homicide. 

A social activist Jomon Puthenpurackal's intervention saw the case being reopened and handed over to the CBI by the court.

The CBI officials arrested three suspects--two priests and a nun-- on November 19, 2008. One of them was acquitted for want of evidence.

20 from UK test positive for COVID-19

3. At least 20 passengers from the UK tested positive for COVID-19 on Tuesday as the government issued a stringent set of SOPs mandating RT-PCR tests at airports for each traveller from the country and isolation in a separate unit of an institutional facility for positive cases in view of the new coronavirus strain. (PTI).

Kerala budget to lay emphasize on women's empowerment - Deshabhimani.

4. സ്ത്രീശാക്തീകരണത്തിന്റെ ചരിത്രത്തിലേക്ക്‌ പുത്തനധ്യായം എഴുതിച്ചേർക്കാനൊരുങ്ങി കേരള ബജറ്റ്‌. തൊഴിൽ മേഖലകളിൽ സ്ത്രീകൾക്ക്‌ കൂടുതൽ അവസരം ഉറപ്പാക്കുന്ന പദ്ധതികൾക്കാകും സംസ്ഥാന ബജറ്റിൽ ഊന്നൽ....

ENDS.

Save Your Money!

 

22 December 2020

Kochi.

The assembly elections in the states of Tamil Nadu, Puducherry, Kerala, West Bengal and Assam are expected to be held in April-May 2022.

The political parties in these states have, more or less, started campaigning for the polls.

The dailies have started reporting about the forthcoming elections.

For instance, a story in The Hindu 'Poll panel gears up for Assembly polls' on page -4 of the Kochi city edition is about Chief Electoral Officer, Kerala, Teeka Ram Meena's interview saying "almost 55,000 M3 model electronic voting machines and almost as many voter verifiable paper audit trail machines will arrive in the State over the next few days as part of the preparations for the Assembly polls next year."

An opinion piece in the daily (tagged 'premium' on the daily's news-site. Difficult times, save your money) is an analysis, 'Tamil Nadu politics after the matriarch, patriarch' by Mr. Narendra Subramanian, a Professor of Political Science, McGill University, Montreal, Quebec, Canada. 

The writer forecasts that the DMK is 'better placed' and the party's prospects look much brighter than AIADMK's in the forthcoming elections and over the coming decade.

This should bring cheer to the supporters of DMK and it's allies. 

But the author fails to substantiate his claim. He just says, "the results of the 2019 parliamentary elections and Assembly by-elections held since Jayalalithaa's passing underline the DMK's status as the electoral favourite," and gives the data of vote shares in those elections.

It fails to look into the present scenario and how things would unfold in the months before the polls.

One key question is how many smaller outfits DMK president M.K.Stalin would be able to rope in to strengthen the opposition front. 

The article fails to mention the impact the two actors, Kamal Haasan and Rajinikanth, and the likely presence of Saskkala--I mean the votes they are likely to split if they contest alone-- would have on the prospects of the two Dravidian rivals. 

To me, looking at the current scenario, it seems like the contest is evenly poised.

------------------------------------

(The M1 and M2 are the older versions of electronic voting machines. M2 EVMs (2006-10)  can cater to a maximum of 64 candidates including NOTA. There is provision for 16 candidates in a Balloting Unit. ... However, M3 EVMs (Post 2013), EVMs can cater to a maximum of 384 candidates including NOTA by connecting 24 Balloting Units.)

---------------------------------------

Dolour.

The rude glare of sun.

The day has fever.

The odour of hospital foyer.

Fire take wing from a

funeral pyre.

The 'vettiyan' is drunk.

He pulls out a bone of hope

from the earth and throws

it away. His hand 

disappears into the well of

his trouser pocket and

comes out with a 

half -smoked beedi. He stands 

there in a drunken daze.

The Poetry of a Derailed Mind

Remembering a Gentleman I and my friend Ramesh met in Thanjavur.

I look back and suddenly, I don't know why and how, I remember this smart, young gentleman, perfectly dressed, in costly sports shoes, who used to walk into the Dinamani/ The New Indian Express office in Thanjavur. 

The office was then located at the first floor of a small complex at the busy Marys Corner. 

Ramesh, who to this day remains not only  one of my dear friends but, whom I respect for his down-to-earth manners and above all for resolute adherence to his principles in life, was then the correspondent of Dinamani. 

People, familiar and strange, used to come to the office, for delivering press statements.

The stranger (what was his name?) I'm speaking about happened to come once in a while. 

He used to silently enter, hand over a paper to Ramesh, and walk out decently. 

The contents of the paper, if I remember correctly, were scribbled with pencil or sometimes pen. But it made no sense. All that we could make out was that he had something to convey about sports. But what he had in his derailed mind had refused to flow onto the paper.

"Sad," Ramesh used to say once he walked out of the office.

I was washing my face after waking up today when I suddenly remembered this young man. 

I don't know why, but, I longed for a moment that, if only I had all the papers the stranger had handed over to us I could have now gone through what he had scribbled in it and tried to make some sense.

Is he alive today? Even Ramesh may not know. Because we've travelled (Through the office window we had a view of the Thanjavur railway station) so far from Marys corner since then. 

By the way there's another interesting character I came across in Thanjavur. He happened to be Ramesh's classmate. All about it later. 

Check Ramesh on Twitter @fydorDos (Like me Dostoevsky happens to be his favourite writer. Check his twitter followers, it would reveal one thing: that nice human beings have few friends or followers).

Pranamam.

Against Death Sentence

 

“The death penalty is the special and eternal sign of barbarity,” Victor Hugo declared in 1848.

Albert Camus  affirmed: “[The ultimate penalty] is no less repulsive than the crime, and . . . this new murder, far from atoning for the offense committed against society, adds a new stain to the first one” 

(Both quotes from Ève Morisi's, Capital Letters.)

The Trump administration executed a truck driver for abusing and killing his two-year-old daughter.

The 56-year-old Louisiana truck driver Alfred Bourgeois was given a lethal injection and was subsequently pronounced dead at the federal prison in Terre Haute, Indiana.

He was the second man to be executed in two days.

According to The Guardian, the driver was the 10th federal death-row inmate put to death since federal executions resumed under Donald Trump in July after a 17-year hiatus.

On Thursday, Brandon Bernard was put to death for his part in a 1999 killing of a religious couple from Iowa after he and other teenage members of a gang abducted and robbed Todd and Stacie Bagley in Texas. The death of Bernard, who was 18 at the time of the killings, was a rare execution of a person who was in his teens when his crime was committed.

"The depravity and evil of this admin’s race to murder as many people on death row as possible is shocking & inhumane. We know how our carceral system works. The wealthy + privileged can buy freedom & leniency, the vulnerable are killed. It must stop. Abolish the death penalty," tweeted US Democratic Representative, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez.

"No matter what crime a person has committed, the act of taking a healthy, breathing, conscious, aware being, strapping him down and snuffing out his life with a lethal injection, is a stain on us all. We must learn to be better than this," observed Sister Helen Prejean hours before Bernard was put to death.

ENDS.

Argentina, Austria & India.

Argentina is poised to become the first major Latin American country to legalize abortion. A legislation, in this regard, was given the green light by lower house.

The bill, which was submitted last month by the leftwing president, Alberto Fernández, was approved on Friday morning by a margin of 131 to 117 votes after a 20-hour debate. It will be voted on by the senate at the end of this month.

In Austria, the country's constitutional court reportedly struck down a law prohibiting primary school children from wearing specific religious head coverings.

It said the law was aimed at the Islamic headscarf and breached rights on religious freedom.

But, in the BJP-ruled Uttar Pradesh in India, a new Anti-Conversion law to render 'love jihad' (a notion that Muslim youths lure Hindu women to marry them in a bid to convert them to Islam) illegal, has drawn flak from the people.

According to a report in the BBC, mouthpieces of the right-wing Hindu nationalist Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS), the BJP's ideological fountainhead, carried cover stories on "love jihad" and urged people to raise the slogan "love for ever, love jihad never!".

Sad...!

ENDS.

 Who's Scared of Spiritual Politics?

SPIRITUALITY —

In a country ruled by right-wing conservative party that hounds minorities and is inclined on creating a Hindu nation, the word evokes a bitter feeling.

DMK women's wing leader and Thoothukudi MP M.K.Kanimozhi's statement on Thursday, which appeared in The Hindu, saying that 'bringing spirituality into politics would not be correct' is to be read in this context.

Kanimozhi is reacting to Rajinikanth's usage of the term when he describes his politics as 'spiritual politics.' He would launch his political outfit on January 1, months ahead of the state assembly polls.

Having said that politics in the country has undergone a sea change after the BJP came to power at the Centre. Electoral victory lately demands the opposition to be open enough to align with any political parties that oppose the BJP as the latter does in its bid to usher in a Congress -free India.

Maharashtra is a good example where the Congress and the NCP share power with the Shiv Sena.

The days of winning elections on the charisma of a single leader are past. Nowadays, winning elections come first.  All the rest are secondary.

ENDS

 As Italians mourn Pablito...

I'm an admirer of Tiqui-taca, the style of short, quick passes as played by the Spanish team under managers Luis Aragones and Vicente del Bosque. The Spanish team let us down in 2018.

Let us forget Spain and cross over to Italy.

The country mourns the death of its 1982 world cup hero Paolo Rossi. Pablito passed away due to an "incurable disease" at the age of 64, weeks after the death of Argentina legend Diego Maradona.

Rossi became a household name in Italy  after scoring six goals at the 1982 World Cup in Spain - leading the Azzurri to a third title.

Matteo Bonetti writing in the bleacher report.com in 2014 describes Rossi as not the epitome of a modern-day No. 9, nor was he even considered as a champion before he made history. He was small, frail and lacked the technique that some other Italian heroes had.

Bonetti mentions that in 1980, Rossi found himself engulfed in the scandal known as Totonero while he played for Perugia. The striker was suspended for three years from football but had his sentence shortened to two seasons instead. Rossi maintained his innocence throughout the ordeal.

"Shortly after, Rossi signed for Juventus and would be called up to the 1982 World Cup, much to the complaint of the media who said he was out of shape and simply not fit enough to be part of an Azzurri squad that wasn't expected to seriously challenge for the trophy," writes Bonetti.

During Italy's first three matches in the competition, Paolo Rossi was diabolical, wandering aimlessly around the pitch and not being an influence in any shape.

After Italy knocked out Argentina with a 2-1 victory, Rossi would go on to score one of the most memorable hat-tricks in history against a superior Brazilian side, as Italy triumphed 3-2 in that match that would go down as one of the most exciting in history.

Thereafter, Italy defeated Poland 2-0 to enter the finals. It defeated West Germany 3-1 to lift the world cup.

Pablito thus rose to glory putting behind the scandal that could have ruined his career.

ENDS

Kamal, Rajini & the cameos of Tamil Nadu politics.

The presence of two actors ('superstars') of Tamil film industry— Kamal Haasan and Rajinikanth —besides, the likelihood of M.K.Alagiri and late chief minister J.Jayalalithaa's aide V.K.Sasikala, may add new features to the state assembly elections due early next year.

The duo, Rajinikanth and Kamal Haasan, are widely seen as B-teams of the BJP. They may be fledgelings. But they are not pushovers. They may or may not win, but they would play spoilsport, by splitting votes, to the two main Dravidian parties.

The impact of Alagiri and Sasikala are likely to be negligible, we may not know until new coalitions are formed.

The ruling AIADMK, for now, appear to have buried their differences in their rank and file caused by the factions led by chief minister Edappadi K.Palaniswami and his deputy O. Panneerselvam. 

Their once 'chinnamma'  Sasikala is expected to come out of Bengaluru central prison where she is undergoing four-year sentence in the disproportionate assets case in January, she may announce her next moves once she returns. 

Will the AIADMK witness any slight tremors due to her presence only time would tell.

The DMK led by M.K.Stalin cannot afford to be callous if it  intends to stop AIADMK from retaining power.

The DMK cannot dream of winning an important election with the Congress, left parties, the Viduthalai Chiruthaigal Katchi (VCK) and a few smaller outfits as its allies.

It is true that the AIADMK would have to contend with the anti-incumbancy factor. The presence of BJP in its fold is widely seen as a negative aspect. But what should be noted is that the BJP is in power at the Centre. The party is capable of aggressive politics and going to any extent to win elections. Moreover, if parties like PMK and DMDK choose to remain in the front it is going to be a stiff fight for power in the state.

Meanwhile, Kamal Haasan has already announced that his Makkal Needhi Maiam (MNM) would go it alone in the polls. Rajinikanth is expected to float his party on January 1.

Rajinikanth took to Twitter recently to announce that he would make an announcement relating to his political outfit on December 31.

The actor said his new outfit would contest state assembly elections due early next year.

Rajinikanth affirmed Tamil Nadu is sure to witness 'spiritual politics'  which, he explained, would be honest, transparent, corruption-free, caste and communal-free politics. 

DMK president M.K.Stalin's estranged elder brother M.K. Alagiri is toying with the idea of floating a party of his own. However, he hasn't made up his mind and is stated to be holding discussions with his supporters.

Whatever, it is clear that the success of the two major political arch rivals, the AIADMK and the DMK would depend on their capability to form a broader front constituting however smaller the outfits are.

ENDS