Historian A. R. Venkatachalapathy said that the tendency to counterpose the contributions of Kerala’s social reformer Narayana Guru with those of Periyar, the founder of the Dravidian Movement, was unhealthy and often used to deride and diminish Periyar.
“It is the same with Nehru and Patel (Jawaharlal Nehru and Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel). If you want to celebrate someone, we are all for it. But if the idea is to run down Nehru, I am not comfortable with it. Narayana Guru’s contribution is amazing,” he said, responding to a question on the relative success and legacy of Periyar vis-à-vis Narayana Guru.
Mr. Venkatachalapathy was speaking during an interaction with journalist Kavitha Muralidharan at The Hindu Lit for Life 2020, on the topic ‘Periyar: Icon or Iconoclast?’. He observed that any question that grappled with Periyar’s personality was inherently difficult.
Recalling Periyar’s political journey, he noted that even when Periyar was president and secretary of the Congress, he articulated independent views, notably through his support for the Hindu Religious Endowments Act.
Mr. Venkatachalapathy, who co-edited The Cambridge Companion to Periyar with Karthick Ram Manoharan, said that unlike figures such as Vallalar or Thayumanavar, Periyar did not believe in gentle persuasion to make people abandon entrenched beliefs. “He believed in shock therapy,” he said.
“In the 1920s, he said idols should be turned over and used as washing stones, and in 1972, he said adultery should be removed from the penal code. When did any lawyer take up the issue of the iniquitous nature of adultery?” he asked.
Mr. Venkatachalapathy said that Periyar’s personality was evident in the fact that he refused to be shattered even after the exodus of almost all the major leaders, including C. N. Annadurai, V. R. Nedunchezhian and M. Karunanidhi, following his marriage to Maniammai.
“He shifted his base from Chennai to Tiruchi and toured every nook and corner of the State. He used a language that was diametrically opposite to the kind of Tamil platform we were familiar with. His health was also failing. He would sit, informally dressed, express the most provocative ideas, and share his wisdom. Every paragraph of his speech bristled with idioms and proverbs that no folklorist could have collected in the last hundred years,” he said.
Speaking about the book’s portrayal of Maniammai, Periyar’s second wife, Mr. Venkatachalapathy said she was an intellectual in her own right and deserved a separate biography. “If there is a book on Manalur Maniammai (the Communist leader), why not a book on Vellore Maniammai?” he asked.
Recalling the calumny heaped on her following her marriage to Periyar in 1949 and 1950, he said that present-day slander spread through WhatsApp could not hold a candle to the attacks she faced then.
He pointed out that no aspersions were cast on 50-year-old George Arundale for marrying 16-year-old Rukmini Devi, nor was he accused of deceiving a young girl. Maniammai, he said, came from a self-respecting family; her father was a second-rung leader of the Dravidar Kazhagam.
“It was a marriage between two consenting adults. Maniammai was 29, educated, well-read, and ideologically oriented,” he said.
He added that from 1944 onwards, Maniammai contributed regularly to Viduthalai and Kudi Arasu, the official organs of the Dravidar Kazhagam, and that her writings, particularly on Kanthapuraman, were sharp and incisive.
“Periyar gifted her Abithana Chinthamani, a 1,000-page encyclopaedia of Tamil literature. That was Periyar’s pick-up line,” he said, adding, “You can imagine what kind of personality she was.”
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