A week ago today, we witnessed an extra-ordinary outpouring of grief at the passing of J Jayalalithaa among the masses gathered at the Apollo Hospital and later at Rajaji Hall, far beyond what is usually seen after the demise of mere mortal leaders, no matter how popular. The anguish etched on the faces was as genuine as it was hard to explain. Charisma, populism, hero-worship, none of these clichéd labels suffice to explain this phenomenon. We have many other charismatic and populist leaders: Narendra Modi, Mamata Banerjee, Mayawati, and Lalu Prasad, are among those who readily come to mind. Yet, with all due respect to their popularity and hold over masses, none of them would appear to be the subject of the adulation of the kind the late chief minister of Tamil Nadu enjoyed in life and, even more so, in death.
And yet a leader more unlike her followers would be hard to find. Jayalalithaa dressed opulently, spoke both Tamil and English with a clipped accent, led what was evidently a grand lifestyle, was distinctly aloof and kept everybody at an arm’s length. Her constituency was mostly the relatively poor, less educated, unsophisticated working class citizenry with rough speech and not in the least shy to give vent to their emotions.
Unlike other stars of the silver screen transformed into successful mass leaders, Jayalalithaa did not deliver thundering orations against injustice in her cinematic career. She was most commonly a singing, dancing companion of her mentor, the dashing M G Ramachandran, who played the champion of the oppressed. But that she created her own niche in politics rather quickly would be an unexceptionable assessment. While her political persona was every bit as larger than life as that of Ramachandran’s, arguably, the reverence her party and her people accorded her was even greater than what he enjoyed.
Since no received wisdom or cannons of social science scriptures seem capable of explaining what sociologist Sanjay Srivastava calls “self-denying (and self-destructing) adoration” of Jayalalithaa (the party already acknowledges 470 deaths, including four suicides, due to unbearable grief), an apocrypha into the causes of her appeal is needed.
When she started her serious political career as chief minister in 1991, she was another very smart leader with a popular mandate to do good. Her instincts propelled her towards good governance actions such as stopping free electricity to farmers and terminating surplus state employees. To her chagrin, she discovered that native intelligence does not guarantee public acceptance. She was certainly not the first one to do so.
The loss of office in 1996 and a sojourn in jail must have caused a great deal of introspection. Her 1999 interview with Simi Garewal, full of bonhomie and camaraderie, offers ample evidence of this. The Jayalalithaa II administration in 2001 showed marked changes aimed at wooing popular support. But even that did not ensure enough electoral IOUs. Her party could not win a single Lok Sabha seat in 2004. She seems to have decided that a benign presence such as that of Mata Amritanandmayi had to be supplemented by a rigid stance of being above arguments and questioning. Her 2004 interview with Karan Thapar shows her at her iciest. With a steely gaze, she refused to explain herself or comment on things she did not want to.
Thus emerged Jayalalithaa III, the giver of boons who could not be challenged by anyone. Her physical appearance resembled countless Raja Ravi Verma or Sivakasi calendar depictions of mythological females. She ensured that she was always at a distance. Her earlier imperious audiences morphed into darshans for the devout. She brooked no dissent and ensured that she had no challengers, banishing early any possible nascent rivals, including her own closest confidant Sasikala Natarajan. But like divine beings who curse mortals, she too could benevolently accept the penitent sinner back into the fold once Ms Sasikala disowned her kith and kin.
This completed the transformation of Jayalalithaa, the charismatic leader into Jayalalithaa the goddess incarnate to her millions of followers. They all, including powerful sub-regional leaders, piously prostrated themselves at her feet. They never questioned her making and unmaking of alliances, often bordering on the whimsical. Hero worship thus gave way to fanatical idolatry. Her Poes Garden fortress of a residence became her living shrine and the seat of real power away from Fort St George. Even the mighty of the land had to come calling on her. If Mani Shankar Aiyar sought her nod for a Lok Sabha seat, so did Mr Modi for a far bigger prize. Her rare forays outside had all the trappings of a Puri rath yatra.
“People never got to know her” laments Ms Vaasanthi, Ms Jayalalithaa’s biographer. But that is how it was meant to be. Mere mortals are not expected to understand either divinity or deus ex machine.
Goddesses have no intimations of mortality, so Ms Jayalalithaa left no heirs. Even biological descent does not imply inheritance of ephemeral qualities such as charisma. The wannabe successors in Chennai are already discovering that mere physical proximity does not assure them of transference of their leader’s mantle, leave alone her magical aura or halo.
The writer is an economist who comments on current developments
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