Four Voices, One Strategy: DMK’s Rajya Sabha Calculus

The Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (DMK) has named its four candidates for the upcoming Rajya Sabha elections from Tamil Nadu. Three of them are party regulars: constitutional lawyer P Wilson, feminist writer and former MLA Salma, and senior leader SR Sivalingam. The fourth is Kamal Haasan, nominated as part of an alliance promise to his party, Makkal Needhi Maiam (MNM).

With 160 MLAs in the 234-member Assembly, the DMK-led alliance has the numbers to sail through. The AIADMK-BJP front, which has 70 seats between them, is a weak challenger. And yet, this is no mere housekeeping exercise. The biennial Rajya Sabha elections have become a litmus test for coalition credibility—particularly for the INDIA bloc—and Tamil Nadu, long a template for alliance politics, is being watched closely.

The Congress, though part of the alliance that swept the 2024 Lok Sabha polls in the state, was denied a seat. Sources within the party have signalled quiet frustration. CPI and VCK, longstanding ideological allies of DMK, have also been passed over. Instead, DMK has honoured its commitment to MNM, which has no elected MLA in the state. Kamal Haasan’s nomination, then, is not a matter of arithmetic. It is a message—one that reinforces DMK’s status as the gravitational centre of the opposition bloc and it reminds its partners that it intends to honour what it promises.

Haasan’s entry into the Upper House is not just a personal milestone but a signal of how DMK is recalibrating its representational logic. The party, forged in the crucible of anti-Brahmin, rationalist, and Tamil nationalist politics, has historically adhered to a strict formula when it comes to nominations—caste representation, ideological clarity, and party loyalty. This slate suggests something more nuanced.

P Wilson, currently serving in the Rajya Sabha, is the DMK’s legal arm in Delhi. A former Additional Solicitor General of India, Wilson has long been among the party’s most vocal constitutionalists. His courtroom battles include challenges to central encroachments on state powers, opposition to changes in tribunal appointments, and strong defence of federalism. In a party once built on mass mobilisation, Wilson is emblematic of DMK’s shift towards technocratic credibility—an image it increasingly projects to distinguish itself from both Hindutva populism and Congress-style nostalgia.

Then comes Salma, born Rokkiah Begum in Thuvarankurichi, a small town in Tamil Nadu. Married at thirteen, denied education, and closely monitored by a conservative Muslim household, she began writing poetry in secret—jotting down verses on paper scraps and hiding them in the bathroom. Her pseudonym, Salma, became a kind of emancipation. Over the years, her poems and novels—haunting, erotic, deeply political—challenged patriarchy and tradition in ways that few female voices in Tamil literature have done. Her 2002 collection An Evening and Other Poems introduced her to a larger world, and her literary acclaim opened a path to politics. She was made head of the Tamil Nadu Social Welfare Board and later became an MLA. Her nomination to the Rajya Sabha marks the elevation of a writer who has always spoken from the margins, and who now brings that voice to the centre.

The third candidate, SR Sivalingam, represents the party’s oldest traditions. A senior leader from Cuddalore district, he served as Minister for Local Administration during the 2006–11 Karunanidhi regime. Unlike Wilson or Salma, he is not a national figure. But within DMK’s ecosystem, he represents continuity, organisational loyalty, and regional balance. His inclusion ensures that the party’s cadre base, especially in the northern districts, remains represented.

Then there is Kamal Haasan. Few public figures have traversed as many roles, both onscreen and off, as Haasan. Actor, director, lyricist, dancer, atheist, rationalist, nationalist—he has tried on ideologies like costumes, sometimes simultaneously. In 2018, he launched Makkal Needhi Maiam with the promise of ethical, efficient governance. The party did not win any seats in the 2019 Lok Sabha or 2021 Assembly elections. But Kamal retained his cultural charisma and carved out a space in urban Tamil discourse—especially among urban first-time voters, professionals, and the disenchanted middle class. By 2024, he had accepted the limits of going solo. MNM joined the DMK-led alliance, and in return, Haasan was promised a Rajya Sabha nomination.

That promise has now been fulfilled. But the nomination is not without friction. Haasan is a Brahmin by birth. In a party forged on the premise of social justice and opposition to Brahminical dominance, his inclusion is radical. He has publicly distanced himself from caste privilege, spoken in favour of inter-caste marriage, and espoused Periyar’s views. But within and outside the party, some view his nomination as a softening of ideological edge. DMK, however, appears to be playing a different game.

In the BJP era, symbolism is a battlefield. Saffron flags, Hindi signboards, Sanskrit prayers in Tamil temples—all form part of a larger aesthetic war. DMK is now beginning to respond not just with policy, but with its own symbolic repertoire. Salma is a minority woman with a radical literary voice. Wilson is a constitutionalist. Sivalingam is an old loyalist. Haasan is the wildcard, a national figure who can speak to a wide range of people, both in Tamil Nadu and beyond. His presence in the Rajya Sabha gives the alliance a visible, articulate, recognisable figure at a time when Parliament has become a performance space.

The Rajya Sabha has often been a sanctuary for failed candidates, retired administrators, and political fixers. But in Tamil Nadu this year, it has become a platform for reimagining what representation looks like. DMK has chosen a lawyer, a poet, a veteran, and a star as instruments in a carefully orchestrated plot, one that courts contradiction, leverages dissent, and turns ideological dissonance into coalition strength.

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