A video clip of a Sun TV news report, of Vairamuthu raining praises on the Tapah MP is currently going viral on social media. The speech is said to have taken place at a function to fete Saravanan in Chennai, India, recently.
"It is because the existence of a person like Datuk Seri Saravanan in Malaysia, that Tamil is very much alive in schools in the country.
"His love for Tamil has spread the language in every street, in the country.
"If a person like 'carries' the Tamil language on their shoulder, like Saravanan does, wherever it may be, we will fete him/her a thousand times," said Vairamuthu.
Vairamuthu further mentioned Saravanan's rise to his recent position in MIC, and politics, from being a mere "tea buying" office boy at the MIC headquarters, in the early 1980s.
"See where this man has gotten in 30 plus years. His position is not a planned 'theft'.
"He worked hard, sacrificed, and crossed many hurdles to get where he is today," said the poet, adding that Saravanan stays grounded, and does not forget his "old friends", despite his position today.
According to Vairamuthu, he had also witnessed Saravanan being "highly respected" by his constituents, even when he was not holding any cabinet position.
'We warned the people'
Speaking at the function, Saravanan also commented on the return of Barisan Nasional (BN) to federal power recently - albeit a joint one with Bersatu and PAS, through the toppling of the Pakatan Harapan government via the "Sheraton Move", two weeks ago.Many have chastised the move, which eventually saw the installation of Muhyiddin Yassin as the new prime minister, as a "backdoor" approach.
Saravanan likened the BN to the Indian National Congress and the Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) in Japan - the first of which is "awaiting return" after being ousted from a long-time federal rule, and the latter, which held power since its foundation in 1955 - except for two short stints.
"The BN was ousted two years ago, by a coalition which has no connection whatsoever to politics.
"We told (the people) that it is not easy to run the country, and it will take a long time to recover if they committed a 'democratic mistake' once.
"They did not believe us. But now it did not even take two years (for Harapan to be ousted)," he said.
Video source: Nakkheeran TV