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Vijay's victory and the Eelam Tamil question | Tamil Guardian
It has been a remarkable week across the Palk Strait. Joseph Vijay, the actor who walked away from one of Tamil cinema's most decorated careers to enter politics, has pulled off a stunning electoral triumph against Tamil Nadu's established parties. His Tamilaga Vettri Kazhagam (TVK) emerged as the single largest force in the 234-member assembly on its first outing at the ballot box, winning 108 seats at an election that recorded the highest voter turnout in the state's history. The DMK, which had governed Tamil Nadu since 2021, was routed. M.K. Stalin lost his own seat. A political landscape dominated by the same two parties for half a century has been overturned. Eelam Tamil representatives greeted the result with hope. ITAK MP Sivagnanam Shritharan described the outcome as a "historic victory" and said that Eelam Tamils see it as their own. Gajendrakumar Ponnambalam's Tamil National Council wrote formally to Vijay urging him to raise the question of a political solution with New Delhi and at international forums, invoking the "umbilical cord relationship" between Eelam Tamils and Tamil Nadu. The sentiments are genuine. The millennia-long connection across the Palk Strait requires no explanation. But it is worth being precise about what this election result means. Vijay's victory was, at its core, an anti-incumbency verdict. Tamil Nadu's voters went to the polls to reject both the DMK and AIADMK for decades of perceived corruption and dynastic entrenchment. Vijay offered something the established parties could not. He had the credibility of an outsider, a charismatic appeal built through years of leading Kollywood roles and the energy of a new political movement spearheaded by a legion of loyal cinema fans. It is a pattern visible across the democratic world with voters reaching for new movements not because they are ideologically precise, but because the old things have failed them. Vijay was not the most outspoken candidate on Tamil Eelam in this election, and his engagement with the cause has been criticised as selective. But he has not shied away from it. Amongst his previous appearances at protests, in November 2008, in the midst of the Sri Lankan military's final offensive, he organised a hunger strike in Chennai and told the crowd "let freedom dawn for Eelam Tamils." During this campaign he described Prabhakaran as having shown Tamil people "motherly love" and called Eelam solidarity a duty. His party's foundational resolutions called for a ref...
Vijay's historic victory, chance for Lanka to reset relations
08 May 2026 • 4 min read Vijay’s two-year-old political party has redrawn the Tamil Nadu electoral map. Though he echoed the long-standing consensus on Sri Lankan issues, this fresh chapter in Tamil Nadu politics may be an opportunity to ‘reset’ Lanka-Tamil Nadu relations. Actor-turned-politician C. Joseph Vijay upended decades of alternating two-party rule in Tamil Nadu. His party, the Tamilaga Vettri Kazhagam, or TVK, secured 108 of 234 seats in Tamil Nadu state elections held last Friday. He is expected to become chief minister. ▶︎ •၊၊||၊|။||||။၊| Listen to this story below the paywall. Lanka on the campaign trailOver the last few years, Vijay, whose father’s Christian family is from Rameswaram, a fishing town, and whose estranged wife is of Sri Lankan origin, has touched on sensitive Indo-Lanka issues. He has repeatedly condemned Sri Lanka’s arrest of Indian fishermen and called for India to reclaim Katchatheevu. In the past, he also demanded a referendum on Tamil Eelam’s independence and spoke favourably of V. Prabhakaran. Though Sri Lankan issues are peripheral in Tamil Nadu politics, the state has historically been an important support base for Tamil separatism and a vocal critic of the Sri Lankan government. At times the state’s government has even influenced Indian foreign policy towards Sri Lanka. Both the Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam, DMK, and All India Anna Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam, AIADMK, have regularly made statements similar to Vijay’s over the years. The DMK manifesto demanded that India reclaim Katchatheevu and review the Indo-Lanka maritime boundary agreements. It also devotes one of its fifty sections to the welfare of the nearly 100,000 Sri Lankan Tamil refugees in India, and calls for a federal solution to Sri Lanka’s national question. The AIADMK manifesto limits itself to promising that “firm steps will be taken to retrieve Katchatheevu”. S. Seeman’s Naam Tamilar Katchi, the party most vocal in support for Tamil Eelam and the LTTE, saw its vote share halve and was unable to secure a single seat. Lankans cautiously optimisticTamil political leaders, including from the ITAK, Tamil Congress, and Ceylon Workers’ Congress, congratulated Vijay. “Hope that the support of the people and government of Tamil Nadu for the Tamil people of Sri Lanka will continue unabated,” tweeted M.A. Sumanthiran, the ITAK’s general-secretary. In an interview with The Examiner, he added that “in our matters it’s mainly the central government that interact...
MP Gajendrakumar calls on Vijay to reaffirm 2013 Sri Lankan Tamil ...
All Ceylon Tamil Congress MP Gajendrakumar Ponnambalam has called on Tamil Nadu Chief Minister C. Joseph Vijay to ensure that the state assembly reaffirms its 2013 resolution recognizing the genocide against Sri Lankan Tamils and demanding an international criminal investigation. In a statement issued on May 10, Ponnambalam congratulated Vijay on his appointment as Chief Minister following the ...
Gajendrakumar Urges Vijay to Declare May 18 as Mullivaikkal Genocide ...
CHENNAI — Gajendrakumar Ponnambalam, leader of Sri Lanka's Tamil National People's Front (TNPF), has formally urged newly sworn-in Tamil Nadu Chief Minister C. Joseph Vijay to declare May 18 as Mullivaikkal Genocide Remembrance Day through an official resolution in the Tamil Nadu Legislative Assembly.
