Makkal Needhi Maiam names Kamal Haasan to contest Rajya Sabha polls

CHENNAI: Six years after launching his political journey, projecting himself as an alternative to the Dravidian parties, actor and Makkal Needhi Maiam president Kamal Haasan will contest the biennial elections for the six Rajya Sabha seats from Tamil Nadu with the backing of DMK and its allies.

As part of the electoral understanding for the 2024 Lok Sabha polls, DMK has allocated a Rajya Sabha seat for MNM, whose leader campaigned for the DMK-led alliance last year. MNM’s urgent administrative and executive committee meeting in the city on Wednesday formally nominated the party founder as its candidate.

With the DMK-led alliance set to win four out of the six RS seats, Kamal Haasan's entering the Upper House has become certain. After failing to win any seats in the 2019 Lok Sabha polls and 2021 Assembly elections, Haasan decided to support the DMK-led alliance in the 2024 Lok Sabha polls, and his party did not contest any seats. In return, the DMK promised a Rajya Sabha seat for the MNM.

A former leader of the MNM, who quit the party post the 2024 Lok Sabha polls, said that the MNM was launched as an alternative to the DMK and the AIADMK in the state to end their corrupt politics.

“But the decision to join the DMK-led alliance has put to rest any hope of the MNM emerging as an alternative. No parties aligned with the Dravidian majors have grown in the state,” he said, pointing to the case of another actor Vijayakant-led DMDK, which polled over 10 per cent in the 2009 Lok Sabha polls when it contested alone.

After joining the AIADMK-led alliance in the 2011 state assembly polls, the fortunes of the DMDK started falling, he said, adding that the MNM would also face the same fate.

MNM leader said that the decision to join the DMK alliance was to fight the communal politics of the BJP.

“It is a strategy not to split the anti-BJP votes. There is a need for the secular parties to remain united against the BJP,” he said.