Periyar: Social revolutionary and militant reformer by Kumar David
(June 01, Colombo, Sri Lanka Guardian) Tamil nationalism in Lanka has either been tame and effete reformism of the GG-Chelva genus, or in an angry rejection of the impotency of this political strand, mindless armed struggle – I mean politically mindless; strategic talent in military affairs is another matter. Now, as this country grinds to a hopeless impasse and self-inflicted ruin, questions are being asked about the legitimacy of Sinhala chauvinism and the futility of the Tamil nationalist cul-de-sac. The LTTE-TMVP standoff, the merciless drubbing that the LTTE was given by the diaspora, for the first time, at a meeting in Toronto called to condemn Maheswari’s assassination, and questions such as those raised in the recent Edirisinha-Welikala book on Federalism, all point to new concerns about the future of Tamil nationalism.
Although Periyar (+++++++++, big man or Sinhala lokku ekkena) is a famous historical figure in India, here in Lanka most people are unfamiliar with this vibrant strand of Tamil Nationalism. This story is worth recounting, not least because of its relevance to a meaningful reinvigoration of Tamil nationalism in Lanka, but also because there is a misconception that the philosophy underpinning the independence movement in British India was no more than woolly Gandhian spiritualism. Periyar’s revolutionary social reformism, militant activism and quixotic incongruities were a more effective antidotes to Gandhi’s antiquated mysticism than Nehru’s aloof rationalism and intellectual socialism; though indeed both Periyar and Nehru were personal atheists and politically secular.
Furthermore, the impending publication, later this year, in English with Tamil and Sinhala translations, of Santasilan Kadirgamar’s The Jaffna Youth Congress, published by the Handy Perinpanayagam Commemoration Society, is timely opportunity for reconsideration of some robust and progressive strands of Tamil nationalism.
E. V. Naicker Ramasamy
Ramasamy was born in 1879, in the then Madras Presidency, in Erode, into an affluent trader-caste family at a time when caste was paramount. Though his mother tongue was Kannada his intellectual life and social activism was immersed in Tamil. For the first twenty five years of his life he was a devout Hindu and then suddenly rebelled, becoming India’s most celebrated atheist and fighter against caste oppression. In his youthful years he was a social worker and a reformer, earning huge respect for his courageous role during an outbreak of the plague, temperance work, championing the cause of the Dalits and his early influence in the business community.
In 1956 the man took a procession of the god Rama garlanded with slippers around Dharmapuri and burnt the effigy in public protest against Hinduism’s accommodation of the caste (varana) system. This of course earned him a spell in the cooler, but as soon as he stepped out, resistance to all forms of social oppression was galvanised again. Long before this, in 1925, he had broken with Gandhi because he found Gandhi soft and accommodating in fighting caste oppression and not robust on issues like Dalit temple entry – but I am getting ahead of my story. However, to complete this paragraph, the turning point in his rejection of caste bound Hinduism was a visit to Benares in 1904 where he encountered flagrant Brahmin discrimination. Gandhi encountered the white man’s apartheid system in South Africa, at about the same time that Ramasamy saw caste oppression, the subjugation of women and mindless mysticism right at home in India; hence their life stories are correspondingly different.
The most enduring strand of Periyar’s activism was the fight to dethrone Brahminism from its privileged position in religion, education, employment and social practices such as untouchability. He was not satisfied with unseating the Brahmin; he wanted the whole god contraption out of the way. His most quoted quote was "He who created god was a fool, he who spreads his name is a scoundrel, and he who worships him is a barbarian". In 1909, unyielding to the protest of orthodox family members and the horror it gave rise to in Hindu society, Periyar arranged the remarriage of his sister's daughter who had become a child widow at the age of 9. On gender issues and the liberation of women, including their sexual liberation in hidebound India, Periyar was far ahead of his time.
The second of many turning points in his life was when under the influence of Gandhi, C. Rajagopalachari (Rajaji) and Vinoba Bhave he joined the Indian National Congress in 1919 and led, with unrelenting courage, the Non-Cooperation Movement against the British in 1921, and the famous Vaikom Struggle in 1924 to secure access to temple roads for depressed castes. He was thrown into prison more than once and it was not long after this that Ramasamy came to acquire the title Periyar. Though his atheism and extreme anti-Brahminism did not win him much popularity, his courage and unshakable personal integrity earned him universal personal prestige. The mettle of the man was such that he quit Congress and parted with Gandhi in 1925 when Congress refused to endorse his demand for reservations in employment and education for depressed castes – clearly, his position on what is now termed affirmative action too was far ahead of his time.
Tamil nationalism
From the time he parted ways with Congress, Periyar was a social activist, not a politician, forming first the Self-Respect Movement, then joining the Justice Party and eventually changing the Party’s name in 1944 to Dravidar Kalaham, forerunner of the DMK. Among his early disciples and lieutenants count the silver tongued C.N. Annathurai founder of the DMK and future Tamil Nadu Chief Minister, the Congress Party’s Kamraj, who was Chief Minister when it was still called Madras State, MGR and today’s Karunanidhi. Periyar refused to form a political party but Annathurai, Karunanidhi and others thirsted for political power and office; this was the root cause underlying the split that brought the DMK into existence in 1949 as a political party with electoral ambitions. Interestingly it was Periyar who first raised the demand for a separate Dravida Nadu to "save the Dravidian race and the Tamil language" from the encroachment of the Brahmin dominated Aryan north and the imposition of the Hindi language. And interestingly it was the DMK which accepted the demand but subsequently abandoned it for sheer survival in the face of the Anti-Secession Act. Periyar however continued with his black shirt demonstrations, flag and map burning and such like exploits which earned him regular confinement in the Republic’s prisons, a continuing legacy of his many previous incarcerations by the Raj.
Nevertheless he had another great victory when having successfully resisted Rajaji’s efforts to impose Hindi on South India, finally, in 1967, he saw Annathurai’s DMK government throw out the Central Government’s three-language prescription, enacting the two-language formula making Tamil and English the official languages of Tamil Nadu state. Rajaji was, of course, a first class reactionary; in 1937 as Prime Minister of the Madras Presidency he made every effort to force Hindi down the throat of an unwilling Dravidian south until he was virtually driven out by protest movements, and as Chief Minister in 1952, he introduced a repugnant education system where students would attend classes in the morning and engage in their traditional caste activities in the afternoon. Unable to fend of stiff opposition from all walks of enlightened opinion this policy was jettisoned by the Kamraj government in 1954.
The bizarre Periyar
Venerated though he was (for example Annathurai, despite Periyar’s vitriolic attacks for deserting social activism for political power, called on him on the morrow of the DMK’s 1967 election victory and dedicated his government to the old man in a motion in the legislature) he will also be remembered for some perfectly bizarre, absolutely quixotic escapades; but what the hell, it’s OK, this is India! This article is not meant to be a full and balanced appraisal of Periyar’s life and work; hence it is possible only to mention a thing or two en passant to let the reader know that there was another side.
At the time of independence he pleaded with the British to retain the Madras Presidency under British rule to save Dravidian culture from the barbarians in the north! He considered Indian independence to be a hoax (remember unbending Samasamajism?) and regularly burnt the flag (remember Philip before corruption?) and sections of the Constitution. He was ambivalent about reproving the Jallianwala Bagh massacre of 1919. He seems to have inverted the Aryan myth of the prehistoric invasion of India by a more noble people who found primitive tribes living in the subcontinent, and replaced it by an equally ridiculous myth of a great pre-existing Dravidian civilization destroyed by ignorant invading hordes from the Caucuses – my understanding is that he was not referring to Mohenjo-Daro and Harappa but the deeper south.
Periyar undertook a European visit in 1931-32 that included the Soviet Union, Germany, England, Greece, Spain, Italy, among others in his itinerary. He was greatly impressed by Soviet "socialism" and addressed workers meetings there; in Germany he visited socialist organizations and in England addressed a huge meeting of 50,000 workers according to his biographers. On his return to India he started working for "Rationalism and Socialism" and Jayaprakash Narayan visited him and tried to persuade him to join the Socialist Party, but nothing much came of all this. Periyar, true to his deeply felt anti-god atheism, always held Nietzsche’s nihilism, rather than Marx’s scientific materialism, closer to his emotional being.
This is not a tutorial
If you thought this was going to end up with some prescription for what Tamil nationalism should be doing in Lanka to get out of its present bind, forget it. Certainly mulling over this wider landscape of several Tamil nationalisms is edifying and enlightening, but I am not a political pharmacist. There are only some broad contours to reflect over and the first and most important lesson is that a programme of vibrant social activism must be the central element in any nationalist struggle; in recent years Hamas and Hezbollah have confirmed this with splendid success. The lesson that the Tigers, unfortunately, learnt too well is that the top-hat and bow-tie middle class reformism of the GG Ponnambalam and SJV Chelvanayagam variety will be mown down by state power and beaten up by majoritarian goons in this modern age of ruthless politics; but the Tigers have countered it with pure militarism and ended up in another bind.
Finally, Periyar’s greatest defeat is a telling lesson. He lost where the DMK was victorious; since 1967 one or other version of the DMK has dominated Tamil Nadu politics and the state legislature. The DMK was flexible and intelligent – I mean shrewd in the political sense, I am not holding a candle for any of these rascals, but I think you get what I mean – while Periyar remained rigid in his positions and inflexible in his methods. Tamil nationalism in Lanka can benefit if it can learn to marinate Periyar type rectitude and courage with condiments such as responsiveness to changing local circumstances and flexibility in international relations.
- Sri Lanka Guardian
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