Two years after declaring that he wanted to fill the “political vacuum” in Tamil Nadu, actor Rajinikanth on Thursday conceded that he can’t challenge the Dravidian majors based on his star power alone.

Without naming the DMK and the AIADMK, he said there were two parties with ‘monstrous strength’.

“On one hand, [DMK]…has not been in power for 10 years and the heir has to prove worthy of the legacy – they have structure, money and men. On the other hand, a party has power and funds. Can I win using my movie popularity, my fans and make the youngsters sacrificial lambs if my party ideology doesn’t work? So, I want to first make it [ideology] clear,” he said.

“Many will say I am a coward; that I got scared. So I thought it would be better to say it upfront,” he added.

Mr. Rajinikanth, who denied that he has been dilly-dallying his political entry for 25 years, said he had first declared his intention on taking the political plunge only on December 31, 2017. Even then he had stated that he was not after positions and that an opportunity for that had presented itself in the mid-1990s itself. Since then he has been thinking on what sort of politics to pursue.

Mr. Rajinikanth said that the post of the CM was like that of a ‘CEO’. “We need to keep the promises that we give to the people. We will create a council of experienced people and make sure that the promises are kept. We need to implement the ideas.”

He had never imagined himself to be CM. “I cannot imagine myself sitting in the Legislative Assembly. It is not in my blood. Many have tried to convince me – including P. Chidambaram, Cho. Ramaswamy – to become the CM before. We need a CM who is young person, educated, talented, kind-hearted and broad-minded person. We will act like an Opposition party. We will also ensure that we won’t interfere in day-to-day activities of government.”

“I said [in 2017] that the system was spoilt and that people’s minds have to be changed. Without changing people’s minds, without fixing the system and political system, there is no point in changing the government. We cannot cook ‘sakkara pongal’ in an unwashed vessel in which we cooked fish curry,” he contended.

Party posts

The DMK and AIADMK have close to 50,000 party posts. He felt that these posts were needed only during elections. Post-elections, only a bare minimum office-bearers were required.

The actor wanted to set aside 65% of seats for those aged below 50. The remaining would be for good people from other parties and distinguished judges, IAS and IPS officers. “If you see in the Assembly, most of them are above 50, 55 or 60 years of age. You can count the youngsters with fingers. New people and good people stay away from politics,” he said.