In one of his films, Rajinikanth delivered a punch line dialogue “If I say it once, it means that I have said it hundred times.” Whether he had his political rivals in his mind when he delivered these lines in the 1995 film Baasha is not known. But the reigning super star of the Tamil tinsel-world repeated on Sunday another dialogue which he had delivered in real life in 2002.
In a brief interaction with farmers led by the maverick Ponnusamy Ayyakannu, who heads the National South Indian Rivers Inter-linking Farmers’ Association, Rajinikanth offered to donate Rs1 crore towards the inter-linking of rivers in the country. He had made a similar offer in 2002 while the cine artists of Tamil Nadu staged a demonstration at Chennai to make Karnakala release the Cauvery River waters to Tamil Nadu.
Speaking to reporters at Chennai on Sunday after the meeting with the super star, Ayyakannu, who had led a group of farmers to New Delhi and staged a demonstration and nude run to draw the attention of the authorities towards the agrarian crisis said that Rajinikanth told them that he would take up with Prime Minister Narendra Modi the need to inter link all the major rivers in the country.
“Rajinikanth offered to donate Rs1 crore immediately towards the project to inter link the rivers. But we requested him to hand over the amount to the Prime Minister,” said Ayyakkanu.
The film actor, who is shooting for a new movie, has taken time off to meet his fans to share with them his thoughts on joining politics. Since last month, Tamil Nadu is agog with rumours about the star’s move to join politics. There are unconfirmed reports that the BJP was planning to project Rajinikanth as their Chief Ministerial candidate.
The Union Government had drawn up a project to inter link the major rivers in the country during the tenure of Atal Bihari Vajpayee as Prime Minisgter during 1998-2004. Vajpayee had set up a Task Force under the chairmanship of Suresh Prabhu, the present Union Railway Minister to prepare a feasibility study about inter-linking Brahmaputra, Ganga, Yamuna, Mahanadi,Godavari, Krishna and Cauvery. Prabhu had submitted a project report in 2004 itself to the Government which is getting dusted. The UPA Government, which ruled India for a decade from 2004 did not take up the project as Congress, leader Rahul Gandhi was against it. “It would lead to an ecological catastrophe,” the Congress vide-president had said about the project.
According to 2003 estimates, the interlinking of rivers would cost the exchequer Rs5,50,000 crore. The returns from the project would have been multi-dimensional in nature. The National Centre for Applied Economic Research had said in its report that the once the rivers are interlinked, the recurring floods which devour the States of Assam, Bengal, Bihar, Uttar Pradesh, Odisha on a yearly basis would become a thing of the past. The cultivable land in the country could be increased three to four-fold as water for irrigation would be available throughout the year. The project would yield 30,000 MW green energy through mini and micro hydel projects and the forest cover in the country would shoot up to more than 30 per cent because of the afforestation resulting from canals criss-crossing the country.
The question being asked by political commentators in Tamil Nadu is that who would accept the domation from Rajinikanth . His promise to the farmers that he would take up the matter with the Prime Minister is also far- fetched as the latter is well aware of the significance of the project.
