CHENNAI: Actor R Sarathkumar on Tuesday merged his party, All India Samathuva Makkal Katchi (AISMK), with the BJP in the presence of the party’s state president K Annamalai.
Explaining his decision, Sarathkumar said while he wanted to serve the people, majority of his political career, however, revolved merely around the electoral questions of how many seats his party would be contesting and with which party would it be aligning with.
Since he could not serve the people sufficiently, he has decided to merge his party with the BJP and work for people. While addressing the media, Sarathkumar referred to Annamalai, who is younger to him, as “annan”. In the coming days, Sarathkumar is likely to be given a key post in the state unit of the BJP.
Sarathkumar has been active in politics since 1994. After short stints with the DMK and the AIADMK, he launched AISMK in 2007. In 2011, in alliance with the AIADMK, his party won two seats - Sarathkumar won from Tenkasi and Ernavur Narayanan from Nanguneri.
In 2016, Narayanan launched his own political party. During the last few days, Sarathkumar held talks with the BJP to be an alliance partner and had announced his support for the saffrom party. However, in a sudden change of mind, he has merged his party with the BJP.