My experience stops me from speaking on politics: Rajinikanth

Vijayawada: Tamil superstar Rajinikanth made some interesting remarks about politics while addressing the centenary celebrations of Telugu icon Nandamuri Taraka Rama Rao or NTR.

He said, looking at the huge crowd, he wants to speak about politics but his experience is stopping him from doing so.

Rajinikanth, who dropped his plans to enter politics in 2021 citing his frail health, shared his thoughts in Telugu.

The superstar recalled how he was inspired by NTR, showered praise on his son and leading Tollywood actor Balakrishna and appreciated the vision of former chief minister and TDP president N. Chandrababu Naidu.

The actor said NTR’s first film that he watched was ‘Patala Bhairavi’ and this left an imprint on his mind.

He said when he was working as a supporting actor and villain, a director approached him and wanted to know if he would act in a film as a hero.

“At that time I was not interested in working as a hero. The director told me to hear the script at least once and revealed that the title of the movie is Bhairavi. The moment I heard the name of the movie, I accepted it,” said Rajinikanth.

The Tamil superstar said, when NTR came to Chennai to celebrate the success of ‘Lava Kusa’, he watched NTR from a distance. Rajinikanth was then 13.

He recalled that he was greatly impressed by the role of Duryodhana played by NTR in ‘Srikrishna Pandaviyam’.

“When I was working as a bus conductor, I played the role of Duryodhana, played by NTR, at a function and, because of the appreciation I received, I started taking an interest in acting,” he said.

Rajinikanth spoke fondly about NTR’s son Nandamuri Balakrishna a.k.a. Balayya. He said Balayya can do what neither he nor Amitabh Bachchan can do.

“My friend (Balayya) kills with his single look. With a single eye blink, a vehicle can blast and go up to 30-feet-high. It cannot be done by Rajinikanth, Amitabh, Shah Rukh Khan or Salman Khan. The public won’t accept it if we do that kind of stuff.”

Rajinikanth said that the audience accepts whatever Balayya does on screen because when they look at him, they see his father NTR in him.

The actor was all praise for N. Chandrababu Naidu for his vision and said that the whole world knows about it.

He pointed out that Naidu developed Hyderabad into an IT hub. He said if lakhs of people are employed today in the IT sector, it was because of Naidu.