The man, the brand

Tucked away in a side street off Chevalier Sivaji Ganesan Salai, this memorial to India's first movie-hero-turned-state-Chief-Minister seems to be an effort to downplay MGR's prominence. But then, it is not a state sponsored memorial, which is on the Marina; this one is maintained by the MGR Memorial Charitable Trust, and is more a storehouse of memories of the man who had a tremendous run of over 5 decades in public life, the first four more as a movie star than a politician and the last, as the state's Chief Minister. Sadly, visitors are not allowed to take pictures inside the house. The official photographer inside will take your picture at certain pre-set locations.

The first thing you see when you enter the drawing room of what used to be MGR's house is the car he used for 10 years - a greenish blue Ambassador, TMX 4777. There is an urban legend that he was sold on the number 4777, because he first became Chief Minister on July 4, 1977. Some years later, when the registration series "MGR" fell due in Maharashtra, he made sure that he bought a car there and had it registered as MGR 4777 - though he never used it much. Other interesting bits that are little known: that he had a lion as a pet - 'Raja' now stands in stuffed glory inside this memorial. He bought the lion for his production "Adimai Penn" - a sequence where he fights the lion impressed Raj Kapoor so much that he wanted tips from MGR when filming a similar sequence for Mera Naam Joker. Though I don't have pictures of either, both car and lion can be seen on the Memorial's website.

In many ways, the house is quite a nice memorial of a man whose political legacy is being claimed by many, even today. After all, it is not everyone who can claim to have won a general election from a hospital bed not just once, but twice: the first time to become an MLA after he was wounded in a fracas in 1967 and the second, all the way from Brooklyn Hospital in New York, in 1984, to be re-elected as the Chief Minister. And if that wasn't enough, a 2008 movie about a taxi carried the number of his car - that's the power of the MGR brand!

Keep your distance

Early last week, the city saw signs like this one being painted on certain roads. These are indeed common enough signs during the election time, but this year, they seemed to have 'doubled' - during the earlier elections, the signs had said '100 m' only, but this time, they had gone all the way up to 200 m.

With about 700 million people across the country being eligible to vote in the just-concluded parliamentary elections, the process of the vote is indeed quite complex - in some sense, it is the pinnacle of organization, with almost every eventuality being considered. One such eventuality is the possibility of 'last metre influence'; therefore, political parties are not allowed to have their voter helpdesks, or any posters, handbills or any other promotional material within the specified distance from a polling booth.

Yet, there seems to have been some gaps. Although the Election Commission of India was clear that the sanitized zone extended up to 200m, the Tamil Nadu Government was still advising the police about a 100m zone!

Party TV

Well, it is not what you think it is, for sure. Rather, if you thought of it as anything other than a medium of political propaganda, then you surely haven't yet caught on to that part of Chennai's spirit! Kalaingar TV has its offices in the same building that houses the DMK's party headquarters. That would certainly make for some interesting scoops!

Local office

The greater agglomeration of Chennai has 3 representatives in Parliament. Very conveniently, the 3 constituencies in Chennai are North, Central and South. In the picture is the office of the Member of Parliament for Chennai South. Situated just behind the Pondy Bazaar police station, this building is normally deserted through the day and for most of the week too, especially when the Parliament is in session.

Things haven't changed much, even when election time has come around. Obviously the MP's office is not the place to meet party workers, but was still surprised to see this kind of propriety being maintained. Maybe it was just the time I passed by? Hope not!

Election fever

Okay, the parliamentary elections are still a month away, so the noise and the mess of the campaigns are yet to hit the city. These - what does one call them - decorations (?) came up outside the party headquarters of the DMK when their candidate won a by-election at Madurai a few months ago.

Sure, we can expect more colours lining the roads over the next few weeks - but not too many more. Almost every local party makes do with just five colours - white, black, red, yellow and blue. One would have thought that a new party would choose a contrasting colour, just to differentiate... but no, they just don't seem to want to!