An old video, purportedly doctored, shows late Chief Minister J Jayalalithaa canvassing for votes for TTV Dinakaran in the campaign for the RK Nagar bye-election. The video, which has gone viral in social media, has attracted the attention of every one as the late leader is seen praising Dinakaran and appealing to voters to cast their vote for `Thoppi’ (cap) symbol.

Though Dinakaran was expelled from AIADMK by Jayalalithaa along with 12 others of V.K.Sasikala’s extended family in December 2011, (immediately after AIADMK won the Assembly elections and came to power), and the latter never did take him back into the party till her death. But Dinakaran has come to occupy the centrestage in the party after the Jayalalithaa phase. He is the candidate contesting on the AIADMK (Amma) ticket.

The doctored video is said to be the handiwork of the IT wing of the Amma faction as Dinakaran wants to `cash in’ on the huge popularity Jayalalitha continues to enjoy.

Though mimicking Jayalalithaa’s ringing voice has been done to perfection, the lip sync is missing in the video.

In the video Jayalalithaa, appears in her trade-mark tunic (she used to wear this garish tunic in the 1990s) eulogising Dinakaran as `good, affable man’, and as `your own son’. While she flaunts the two leaves symbol in her own inimitable style, her lips say vote for `thoppi’ symbol.

Political observers see the use of this video trick to the fact that there are no star campaigners for the Amma faction now. The old video has come in handy to reach out to the voters, in which Dinakaran looks much younger.

“It may be recalled Dinakaran had successfully contested from Periyakulam Lok Sabha constituency in 1999 on the AIADMK ticket. Jayalalithaa had campaigned for him then and the video has come in handy to tackle the turf war in RK Nagar, where the bypoll has been necessitated by the demise of the late leader” said senior AIADMK functionary K. Nachimuthu.