It's not donkey ads alone that drag Amitabh Bachchan into UP in the midst of polls

It was the Bofors scandal that forced Amitabh Bachchan to quit politics, according to general perception. That may well have been one of the reasons, but in a 2008 blog post, the superstar wrote:

"I felt for 25 years I had tried to woo my audience to love me as an artist, as an actor. And once I had accomplished that, I was now telling them to love my politics as well. Not acceptable to me. It was wrong. I was wrong. I was dividing my audience and my fans."

This meant it was the divisive nature of politics that forced the Big B to exit from the profession.

Despite being seen regularly with politicians, Amitabh Bachchan has tried hard to maintain a safe distance from politics. There was a time when he was regularly seen with Samajwadi Party president Mulayam Singh Yadav and Rajya Sabha MP Amar Singh - and now his proximity to Prime Minister Narendra Modi is well-known.

While his wife Jaya Bachchan is an Rajya Sabha member from SP, the actor himself has steered clear of active political engagement. Yet, Amitabh Bachchan is often embroiled in political controversies. At least on two occasions, advertisements featuring him became tools for political barbs in his home state of Uttar Pradesh.

The most recent was on February 20, when, while addressing an election rally in Uttar Pradesh's Rae Bareli, chief minister Akhilesh Yadav took a dig at Prime Minister Narendra Modi and superstar Amitabh Bachchan, the brand ambassador of Gujarat tourism.

Akhilesh said, "Ek gadhe ka vigyapan aata hai, main iss sadi ke sabse bade mahanayak se kahunga ke ab aap Gujarat ke gadhon ka prachar mat kariye (I would urge the superstar of the century (Amitabh Bachchan) to stop advertising the donkeys of Gujarat)." 

The ad Akhilesh was referring to shows Amitabh inviting tourists to visit the Wild Ass Sanctuary in Gujarat's Rann of Kutch.

The UP chief minister's real target was PM Modi, but Amitabh Bachchan became the medium of ridicule. The BJP came out in defence of Big B and hit back at Akhilesh Yadav, with Gujarat chief minister Vijay Rupani stating that it was an insult to the people of his state and Amitabh Bachchan.

"Akhilesh has got the hint that they are going to lose. He is frustrated and thus he is making all these comments. He has insulted people of Gujarat and Amitabh Bachchan," Rupani told India Today.

Exactly a decade ago, in 2007, at the peak of the election season in Uttar Pradesh, the Samajwadi Party was contesting to retain power in the state - and Amitabh Bachchan was in the centre of another controversy.

He was then the brand ambassador for UP and had appeared in an advertisement of the UP government where he mouths the lines "UP mein hai dum, jurm hai yahan kam".

It was shown on high frequency across various TV channels and the opponents the SP went after not only the SP government, but also criticised Bachchan.

The big question asked at that time was, how could Bachchan support an administration that had let the horrific Nithari killings happen under its watch? The fallout of that advertisement contributed to the downfall of Mulayam Singh - and he lost power in 2007.

Ironically, in the same year, Amitabh Bachchan had been attacked by all the Opposition parties, including the BJP, and it was only SP alone that tried to defend the actor.

10 years later, tables have turned and it is now Samajwadi Party that is attacking him - and the BJP rising to his defence. A decade ago, and now, what everyone seems to have forgotten that Amitabh Bachchan is an actor who merely speaks the lines written for him. The nature of his advertisements turn out to be ammunition in the hands of politicians.

So while Amitabh Bachchan may try his damndest to keep away from politics, it is politics that won't leave him in peace. Big B has to realise that it is not politics per se that he has to keep away from - but the politician. For bedfellows come with bugs that keep biting.