When Rajini met Yogi: Reading too much into a picture?

The meeting that grabbed the most attention was Rajinikanth’s with Adityanath, where the star reached down to touch the CM’s feet. For many fans, including those who see Adityanath as representative of all that is anathema to Tamil Nadu politics and culture, this was a “betrayal” by a star whose fans treat him as God. To those who continue to harbour hopes of Rajinikanth making a long-expected political plunge, it was a declaration of his leanings.

Film actor Rajinikanth touches the feet of Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath during a meeting, in Lucknow, Saturday, Aug 19, 2023. (PTI Photo)

Just before the photo emerged of the Lucknow meeting, there was buzz about how Tamil Nadu Chief Minister M K Stalin and his Kerala counterpart Pinarayi Vijayan – both avid anti-BJP leaders – had watched Jailer.

Soon, an old video surfaced of fellow Tamil actor and budding politician Kamal Hassan, an atheist, talking about “never touching the feet of anyone, even God”. Kerala Education Minister V Sivankutty quipped: “Stretching and bending are always good, but the way (Rajinikanth) bent, he could have broken (his) back in two.”

A section worried that an “endorsement” of this kind, by none other than Rajinikanth, would help “validate” the image of the UP CM in Tamil Nadu, ahead of the 2024 Lok Sabha polls.

However, those who know Rajinikanth closely say that the storm in a teacup again shows how the actor, who plays by few rules of stardom, continues to be misunderstood. They tell you to not mix the secular with the spiritual, the political with the personal, and the superstar with the humble seeker.

Born Shivaji Rao Gaekwad and “discovered” while working as a bus conductor, Rajinikanth has always been mindful of a sense of destiny, and remains a deeply spiritual man transcending his fame and fortune. As he himself described his gesture towards Adityanath, “A sanyasi or a yogi, even if they are younger to me, it is my practice that I touch their feet. That’s all I did there.”

S Shankar, a friend of Rajinikanth who played a crucial role when the actor was seriously considering politics, calls him someone “who would fall at the feet of even a child if he believed in it”. “In UP, he was honouring the yogi in Adityanath… Those who view the world solely through a political lens can get upset all they want,” Shankar says.

He says it is not about impressing anyone, and that Rajinikanth has not accorded similar “respect” to Prime Minister Narendra Modi, or the late M G Ramachandran, J Jayalalithaa and M Karunanidhi, as well as others such as former PMs Narasimha Rao and A B Vajpayee. “Rajini never does things for personal gains. In UP, he touched the feet of a yogi, not a BJP CM,” Shankar says.

An aide who often accompanies Rajinikanth on his spiritual trips says the actor was honouring Adityanath as the head of the Gorakhnath Mutt. “Rajini has nothing to gain from the UP CM. He was just respecting his spiritual tradition,” he says.

Others point to Rajinikanth’s Karnataka links. While Hindu mutts in Tamil Nadu remain on the sidelines of politics due to the prevalent Dravidian ideology, in Karnataka, they are very powerful.

In an interview with The Indian Express in 2018, Rajinikanth’s elder brother Satyanarayana Rao Gaekwad had described him as “very humble”, adding: “Till he was 18, he visited the Ramakrishna Mutt near our Bangalore house every day.”