Back in 2024, the year Joseph Vijay launched his party, the Tamilaga Vettri Kazhagam (TVK), he made several punch dialogues in his speeches. During his speech at a massive rally at V. Salai near Vikravandi in Vizhupuram district, Tamil Nadu, he addressed the huge crowd of his supporters, not only elaborated on his party’s ideologies but also fixed who his political enemies were.
Taking potshots at the DMK/Dravidianists indirectly, Vijay said that there is a “crowd” that tries to paint a colour to anyone who makes a political entry.
“There is a crowd here that for sometime has been singing the same paeans. Anybody who comes into the politics is given ‘one particular colour’. They keep fearmongering people and cheat them. But ‘these people’ (indirect reference to DMK) will put underground dealing with ‘them’ (indirect reference to BJP). During elections, they will give statements and give sounds. For them, it’s always ‘fascism’, ‘fascism’, ‘fascism’. Among the people who are united here, they fearmonger by splitting people as majority-minority and keep putting a full-time scene with it. I’m asking you – If ‘they’re fascism’, are you ‘payasam’?. You’re no better than them. You call this anti-people government as a ‘Dravida Model’ government and cheating people.“, Vijay blasted the DMK.
Cut to 2026, post-result scenario. Social media was abuzz with videos of a recently elected TVK MLA from Thanjavur who was reportedly drunk and was dancing to a Tamil film song with a bottle of alcohol.
The video was shared by a handle named @SparkPluz_ and several other news channels also reported. However, the handle stated that they received a notice from the police department issued by the Cyber Crime Police Station, Thanjavur District, on 6 May 2026 and addressed to Twitter, Inc. According to the notice, a complaint from a Thanjavur resident alleged that the account @SparkPluz_ had shared a video concerning Vijay Saravanan with the intention of defaming and demoralizing him, prompting police to seek IP logs and activity details from the platform.
செய்தி வெளியிட்டதற்காக @SparkPluz_ க்கு மிரட்டல் விடுக்கும் தவெகவினர்! https://t.co/QvYMaY0abn pic.twitter.com/y4xgL10OFP
— Spark+ (@SparkPluz_) May 7, 2026
There were a few handles claiming the video was 5 years old.
This was the same modus operandi of the DMK and its IT Wing – both official and unofficial. Several people across the spectrum have been targeted and cases dumped on them in the past 5 years.
For a party that rose by attacking “fascism,” political intimidation, and fear-driven politics, TVK seems to be doing exactly what it accused the DMK of doing – being ‘fascist’ and not permitting freedom of speech. When criticism or embarrassing content is immediately met with cyber crime complaints and attempts to trace anonymous users, the optics begin to resemble the very political culture Vijay once mocked on stage. The issue is no longer just about one video. It is about whether TVK can truly handle criticism differently from the parties it promised to replace.
So, does this mean that TVK is DMK 2.0?
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