Birthdays of politicians in South India are an occasion for their followers to indulge the neta and massage their already much-bloated ego. And in the 'Rajinikanth Territory Extension', a.k.a Puducherry - 170 km from Chennai - what better way than to make a politician look like `Kabali'?
That is what the cadre of NR Congress did, photoshopping former Puducherry chief minister N Rangasamy as Kabali on his birthday on August 4 when he turned 66. Rangasamy's followers say like the Superstar, Rangasamy's too is a very simple person who has come up from an extremely humble background.
Politically, however, this means nothing as Rangasamy will have to wait another five years before he can say, a la Rajini, "Thirimbi vandutten nu sollu" (Tell him that I am back).
Rangasamy's party suffered a humiliating defeat in the assembly elections, losing to the Congress-DMK alliance, though Rangasamy himself won from the Indira Nagar constituency.
That fawning followers of politicians see them as master actors is obvious from the manner in which they cast them in different roles.
If Kabali is the flavour of the season this birthday, last year saw Rangasamy doing a Baahubali, lifting the Shivalinga.
He has also been seen in the photoshopped company of President Obama and Queen Elizabeth. His followers, for some reason, decided to embrace the Brits and the Americans, instead of Puducherry's French roots.
Rangasamy's followers perhaps have taken inspiration from the admirers of M Karunanidhi's son Alagiri, who morphed him into former President APJ Abdul Kalam and Subhash Chandra Bose.
In cricket-crazy Tamil Nadu, they even showed Alagiri and father Karunanidhi as men in blue.
Jayalalithaa's AIADMK chose to cast her in a Bahubali avatar at the most inappropriate juncture. When much of north Tamil Nadu was under water and Jayalalithaa was nowhere to be seen on the ground, one of them put up a hoarding showing Jaya as the character played by actor Ramya Krishna, rescuing the baby prince from swirling waters.
Further up north in Telangana, a follower of Industry minister KT Rama Rao engaged a chopper to shower flowers over Hyderabad on the occasion of his leader's birthday last month.
This even as KTR frowned upon the city being dotted with his cutouts.
In the run-up to the release of `Kabali', Puducherry Lt Governor Kiran Bedi tweeted to Rajinikanth requesting him to be the brand ambassador for the 'Prosperous Puducherry' campaign.
The Puducherry collector also offered free tickets for 'Kabali' to those who used the public services of the government.
So even as Bedi reaches out to the Tamil superstar, Rangasamy has decided that he will play the reel Rajinikanth till the real Rajinikanth comes visiting.
