COIMBATORE: Mayor P Rajkumar has earned a PhD on the completion of his thesis on ‘The Emergence of J Jayalalithaa as Mass Political Leader: A Study’.
The viva voce was conducted on Monday. At the end of the viva voce, the external examiner, V Natarajan, Head of the Department of Journalism and Mass Communication, Periyar University, Salem declared that the PhD thesis had been accepted for the award of the doctoral degree by Bharathiar University.
Rajkumar’s research work has concluded that “During contemporary times, the former Chief Minister of Tamil Nadu and AIADMK general secretary, J Jayalalithaa, has emerged as a unique woman mass political leader in Tamil Nadu with clear determination to play a significant role in national politics.”
“Her emergence in politics and to the State's governance have been through a process involving many challenges, struggles and political strategising. The search for identity and mediations have been crucial. Nothing was a chance occurrence,” it says.
“Befitting the status and dynamic of a mass political leader, her prioritisations have run parallel to and ahead of the mass prioritisations. Because of this mass backdrop, her party still remains a movement with high potential and her party emblem has attained a magical-chant like efficacy. She derives inspiration from the masses which keeps her in the leadership even against the odds and liberates her from gender hurdles,” Rajkumar concluded in his dissertation.
Expressing his happiness about doing the research on Jayalalithaa, Rajkumar said,“She has a unique character of perseverance and courage, like Ellen Johnson, the first black female Liberian President and Michelle Bachelet who was President of Chile between 2006 and 2010.”
Rajkumar identified five district headquarters - Tirchy, Coimbatore, Salem, Madurai and Chennai - and villages in these districts for data collection and analysed the popular perception rating of the leader using the California Psychological Inventory.
“I distributed the questionnaires intended to study their personality perceptions about the leadership qualities of J Jayalalithaa with reference to traits. Of the total 900 respondents, 510 sample responses with complete answers were finally included in the study,” he said.
Rajkumar carried out his research under the guidance of C Pichandy, Head of the Department of Communication, PSG college of Arts and Science.