The Jaya we never knew: ‘Jayalalithaa’s marriage to a family friend didn't materialise'

Before her entry into full-time politics, Jayalalithaa was all set to get married to a family friend’s son named Arun Kumar from Mysore, it has been revealed in the final episode of the Thanthi TV documentary Jayalalithaa Enum Naan. This was the period when the former CM longed for a ‘normal’ life with family, while still being indecisive about her political career.

“We looked at four to five boys. Arun stood out and was very good looking too. We thought the wedding would be finalised too, but unfortunately it didn't materialise,” reveals her relative Amitha Chari. “If her mother hadn’t passed away, her personal life would have been much happier. She was lonely; the environment influenced her, and people took advantage. She always said nobody was there to take care of her," adds Anuradha.

There is also insight on Jayalalithaa’s decision to get a liposuction in the US. Srinivasan’s daughter Anuradha says that Jayalalithaa wanted to get the procedure done. “She even sent us before and after pictures to show the difference in her figure, and was very happy with the result,” Anuradha says.

Such was Jayalalithaa’s impeccable sense of style that her cousins speak of fangirling over Ammu akka. “Her make-up artist, hair stylist and tailor would be there, and we’d eagerly wait to get a first glimpse of her in the morning. She always made time for us… Her favourite attire in the house was to wear silk lungis and kurtas,” they recall. 

But after moving to Veda Nilayam and following her mother’s death, Jayalalithaa slowly went out of touch. “Her defences were sealed, and she became a stranger to us as she got sucked into the whirlpool of politics. She created a chasm between us,” the cousins say.

Though there were a couple of meetings over the years when Jayalalithaa was at her hospitable best, by and large, Ammu was in the process of becoming Amma: a person they couldn’t recognise anymore. “None of us had interacted with her in decades when news of her death broke. Watching her funeral on television broke us. All the memories came rushing back to us… but that’s all we could do: watch and cry.”