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Tamil Nadu History – TNPSC Exams

The Tamils are an ancient people. Their history had its beginnings in the rich alluvial plains
near the southern extremity of peninsular India which included the land mass known as the
island of Sri Lanka today. The island's plant and animal life (including the presence of
elephants) evidence the earlier land connection with the Indian sub continent. So too do
satellite photographs which show the submerged 'land bridge' between Dhanuskodi on the
south east of the Indian sub-continent and Mannar in the north west of the island.

Some researchers have concluded that it was during the period 6000 B.C. to 3000 B.C. that
the island separated from the Indian sub continent and the narrow strip of shallow water
known today as the Palk Straits came into existence. Many Tamils trace their origins to the
people of Mohenjodaro in the Indus Valley around 6000 years before the birth of Christ.
There is, however, a need for further systematic study of the history of the early Tamils and
proto Tamils.

"Dravidians, whose descendents still live in Southern India, established the first city
communities, in the Indus valley, introduced irrigation schemes, developed pottery and
evolved a well ordered system of government." (Reader's Digest Great World Atlas, 1970)

Clyde Ahmad Winters, who has written extensively on Dravidian origins commented:

"Archaeological and linguistic evidence indicates that the Dravidians were the founders of
the Harappan culture which extended from the Indus Valley through northeastern
Afghanistan, on into Turkestan. The Harappan civilization existed from 2600-1700 BC. The
Harappan civilization was twice the size the Old Kingdom of Egypt. In addition to trade
relations with Mesopotamia and Iran, the Harappan city states also had active trade relations
with the Central Asian peoples."

He has also explored the question whether the Dravidians were of African origin. (Winters,
Clyde Ahmad, "Are Dravidians of African Origin", P.Second ISAS,1980 - Hong Kong:Asian
Research Service, 1981 - pages 789- 807)

Other useful web pages on the Indus civilisation (suggested by Dr.Jude Sooriyajeevan of the
National Research Council, Canada) include the Indus Dictionary.

At the same time, the Aryan/Dravidian divide in India and the 'Aryan Invasion Theory' itself
has come under attack by some modern day historians. (see also Sarasvati-Sindhu
civilisation; 'Hinduism: Native or Alien to India')

Professor Klaus Klostermaier in 'Questioning the Aryan Invasion Theory and Revising
Ancient Indian History' commented:

"India had a tradition of learning and scholarship much older and vaster than the European
countries that, from the sixteenth century onwards, became its political masters. Indian
scholars are rewriting the history of India today.One of the major points of revision concerns

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the so called 'Aryan invasion theory', often referred to as 'colonial-missionary', implying that
it was the brainchild of conquerors of foreign colonies who could not but imagine that all
higher culture had to come from outside 'backward' India, and who likewise assumed that a
religion could only spread through a politically supported missionary effort.

While not buying into the more sinister version of this revision, which accuses the inventors
of the Aryan invasion theory of malice and cynicism, there is no doubt that early European
attempts to explain the presence of Indians in India had much to with the commonly held
Biblical belief that humankind originated from one pair of humans- Adam and Eve to be
precise ..."

Hinduism Today concluded in Rewriting Indian History - Hindu Timeline:

"Although lacking supporting scientific evidence, this (Aryan Invasion) theory, and the
alleged Aryan-Dravidian racial split, was accepted and promulgated as fact for three main
reasons. It provided a convenient precedent for Christian British subjugation of India. It
reconciled ancient Indian civilisation and religious scripture with the 4000 bce Biblical date
of Creation. It created division and conflict between the peoples of India, making them
vulnerable to conversion by Christian missionaries."

"Scholars today of both East and West believe the Rig Veda people who called themselves
Aryan were indigenous to India, and there never was an Aryan invasion. The languages of
India have been shown to share common ancestry in ancient Sanskrit and Tamil. Even these
two apparently unrelated languages, according to current "super-family" research, have a
common origin: an ancient language dubbed Nostratic."

Tamils were a sea faring people

Robert Caldwell wrote in 1875:

"... From the evidence of words in use amongst the early Tamils, we learn the following items
of information. They had 'kings' who dwelt in 'strong houses' and ruled over 'small districts of
country'. They had 'minstrels', who recited 'songs' at 'festivals', and they seem to have had
alphabetical 'characters' written with a style on palmyra leaves. A bundle of those leaves was
called 'a book'; they acknowledged the existence of God, whom they styled as ko, or King....
They erected to his honour a 'temple', which they called Ko-il, God's-house.

They had 'laws' and 'customs'... Marriage existed among them. They were acquainted with the
ordinary metals... They had 'medicines', 'hamlets' and 'towns', 'canoes', 'boats' and even 'ships'
(small 'decked' coasting vessels), no acquaintance with any people beyond the sea, except in
Ceylon, which was then, perhaps, accessible on foot at low water.. They were well
acquainted with agriculture.... All the ordinary or necessary arts of life, including 'spinning',
'weaving' and 'dyeing' existed amongst them. They excelled in pottery..." (Robert
Caldwell:Comparative Grammar of Dravidian or South Indian Family of Languages -
Second Edition 1875 - Reprinted by the University of Madras, 1961)

The Tamils were a sea faring people. They traded with Rome in the days of Emperor
Augustus. They sent ships to many lands bordering the Indian Ocean and with the ships went
traders, scholars, and a way of life. Tamil inscriptions in Indonesia go back some two

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thousand years. The oldest Sanskrit inscriptions belonging to the third century in Indo China
bear testimony to Tamil influence and until recent times Tamil texts were used by priests in
Thailand and Cambodia. The scattered elements of ruined temples of the time of Marco
Polo's visit to China in the 13th century give evidence of purely Tamil structure and include
Tamil inscriptions.

"Tamil Nadu, the home land of the Tamils, occupies the southern most region of India.
Traditionally, Thiruvenkatam - the abode of Sri Venkatewara and a range of hills of the
Eastern Ghats - formed the northern boundary of the country and the Arabian sea line the
western boundary. However as a result of infiltrations, made by peoples from other
territories, Tamil lost its ground in the west as well as in the north. In medieval times, the
country west of the mountains, became Kerala and that in the north turned part of Andhra
Desa. Bounded by the states of Kerala, Karnataka and Andhra Desa, the Tamil Nadu of the
present day extends from Kanyakumari in the south
to Tiruttani in the North....

In early times the Pandyas, the Cheras and

"In the first decade of the 14th century the rising tide
of Afghan imperialism swept over South India. The
Tughlugs created a new province in the Tamil
Country called Mabar, with its capital at Madurai which in 1335 asserted independence as the
Sultanate of Madurai. After a short period of stormy existence, it gave way to the
Vijayanagar Empire... Since then, the Telegus, the Brahminis, the Marathas and the
Kannadins wrested possession of the territory. Between 1798 and 1801, the country passed
under the direct administration of the English East India Company." (History of Tamil Nadu
1565 - 1982: Professor K.Rajayyan, Head of the School of Historical Studies,
M.K.University, Madurai - Raj Publishers, Madurai, 1982)

The East India Company website contains interesting information about the efforts of the
early English rulers.

Today an estimated 70 million Tamils live in many lands - more than 50 million Tamils live
in Tamil Nadu in South India and around 3 million reside in the island of Sri Lanka.

British conquest & Tamil renaissance

The response of a people to invasion by aliens from a foreign land is a measure of the
depth of their roots and the strength of their identity. It was under British conquest that
the Tamil renaissance of the second half of the 19th century gathered momentum.

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It was a renaissance which had its cultural beginnings in the discovery and the subsequent
editing and printing of the Tamil classics of the Sangam period. These had existed earlier
only as palm leaf manuscripts. Arumuga Navalar in Jaffna, in the island of Sri Lanka,
published the Thirukural in 1860 and Thirukovaiyar in 1861. Thamotherampillai, who was
born in Jaffna but who served in Madras, published the grammatical treatise Tolkapiyam by
collating material from several original ola leaf manuscripts.

It was on the foundations laid by Arumuga Navalar and Thamotherampillai that Swaminatha
Aiyar, who was born in Tanjore, in South India, put together the classics of Tamil literature
of the Sangam period. Swaminatha Aiyar spent a lifetime researching and collecting many of
the palm leaf manuscripts of the classical period and it is to him that we owe the publication
of Cilapathikaram, Manimekali, Puranuru, Civakachintamani and many other treatises which
are a part of the rich literary heritage of the Tamil people.

Another Tamil from Jaffna, Kanagasabaipillai served at Madras University and his book
'Tamils - Eighteen Hundred Years Ago' reinforced the historical togetherness of the Tamil
people and was a valuable source book for researchers in Tamil studies in the succeeding
years. It was a Tamil cultural renaissance in which the contributions of the scholars of Jaffna
and those of South India are difficult to separate.

Again, not surprisingly, it was a renaissance which was also linked with a revived
interest in Saivaism and a growing recognition that Saivaism was the original religion of
the Tamil people. Arumuga Navalar established schools in Jaffna, in Sri Lanka and in
Chidambaram, in South India and his work led to the formation of the Saiva
Paripalana Sabai in Jaffna in 1888, the publication of the Jaffna Hindu Organ in 1889
and the founding of the Jaffna Hindu College in 1890.

In South India, J.M.Nallaswami Pillai, who was born in Trichinopoly, published Meykandar's
Sivajnana Bodham in English in 1895 and in 1897, he started a monthly called Siddhanta
Deepika which was regarded by many as reflecting the 19th century ' renaissance of
Saivaism'. A Tamil version of the journal was edited by Maraimalai Atikal whose writings
gave a new sense of cohesion to the Tamil people - a cohesion which was derived from the
rediscovery of their ancient literature and the rediscovery of their ancient religion.

Bharathy, Periyar E.V. Ramasamy & Tamil nationalism

The cultural renaissance of the 19th century led to an increasing Tamil togetherness and was
linked with the thrust for social reform and political power - a thrust which at the same time,
sought to marry a rising Tamil togetherness with the immediate and larger struggle for
freedom from British rule.

In South India, no one exemplified the marriage of this duality more effectively
than Subramania Bharathy whose songs in Tamil stirred the hearts of millions of Tamils, both
as Tamils and as Indians. The words of Bharathy's Senthamil Nadu Enum Pothinale, continue
to move the hearts of the Tamil people today. It was his salute to the Tamil nation that was
yet unborn. His Viduthalai was the joyous song of Indian freedom and there he reached out
beyond the Tamil nation to the day when Bharat would be free.

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Bharathy sought to consolidate the togetherness of his own people by his ceaseless campaign
against casteism and for women's rights. The Bharathy birth centenary celebrations of 1982
served to underline the permanent place that Bharathy will always have in the hearts of the
Tamil people, whether they be from Tamil Nadu, Tamil Eelam, Malaysia, Singapore or
elsewhere.

Two other Tamils will be always associated with the rise of Tamil national consciousness in
the first two decades of the 20th century - lawyer, Tamil scholar and
revolutionary, V.V.S.Aiyar and the Swadeshi steam ship hero, Kappal Otiya Thamilan,
V.O.Chidambram Pillai.

Aiyar was a lawyer who joined Grays Inn in London to become a barrister but became a
revolutionary instead. Later, he wrote many books in Tamil and in English and is regarded by
many as the father of the modern Tamil short story. He was a pioneer in Tamil literary
criticism. His major works included a translation of the Thirukural and 'Kamba Ramayanam -
A Study'.

In the years after the first World War, Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi reached out to the
underlying unity of India and sought to weld together the many peoples of the Indian
subcontinent into a larger whole. But the attempt did not entirely succeed. The assessment of
Pramatha Chauduri who wrote in Bengali in 1920 was not without significance:

"...You have accused me of 'Bengali patriotism'. I feel bound to reply. If its a crime for a
Bengali to harbour and encourage Bengali patriotism in his mind, then I am guilty "But I ask
you, what other patriotism do you expect from a Bengali writer? The fact that I do not write
in English should indicate that non Bengali patriotism does not sway my mind. If I had to
make patriotic speeches in a language that is the language of no part of India, then I would
have had to justify that patriotism by saying it does not relate to any special part of India as a
whole. In a language learnt by rote you can only express ideas learnt by heart.

"It is not a bad thing to try and weld many in to one but to jumble them all up is dangerous
because the only way we can do that is by force. If you say that this does not apply to India
the reply is that if self determination is not suited to us, then it is not suited at all to Europe.
No people in Europe are as different, one from another, as our people. There is not that much
difference between England and Holland as there is between Madras and Bengal. Even
France and Germany are not that far apart...If you ask why this simple truth is not evident to
all the answer is: because of circumstances. The whole of India is now under British
rule...therefore, the main link between us is the link of bondage and no province can cut
through this subjugation by its own efforts and actions...So today we are obliged to tell the
people of India, 'Unite and Organise'...

"People will recognise the value of provincial patriotism the moment they attain
independence...Then the various nations of India will not try to merge, they will try to
establish a unity amongst themselves... To be united due to outside pressure and to unite
through mutual regard are not the same. Just as there is a difference between the getting
together of five convicts in a jail and between five free men... Indian patriotism then will be
built on the foundation of provincial patriotism, not just in words but in
reality..."(Pramatha Chaudhuri: Bengali Patriotism - Sabuj Patra 1920, translated and
reprinted in Facets, September 1982)

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In Madras Presidency, which was the largest province of British India, and which included
parts of that which is Andhra, Karnataka and Kerala today, the Suya Mariyathai Iyakam (Self
Respect Movement) of E.V.Ramasamy (Periyar) started initially, in the early 1920s, as a
social reform movement aimed at a casteless society. It later developed into a vehicle for a
rising Tamil nationalism.

"The Tamil Renaissance took place at the same time as the Nationalist Movement. The
outcome of this interaction of the renaissance and the Nationalist Movement was the genesis
of a consciousness of a separate identity resulting in Dravidian Nationalism.... In philology
the term 'Dravidian' was used to denote a group a group of languages mainly spoken in South
India, namely, Tamil Telegu, Kannada and Malayalam. Later when the term was extended to
denote a race, again it denoted the peoples speaking these four languages. But in South Indian
politics as well as in general usage since the beginning of this century the term 'Dravidian'
came to denote the 'Tamils' only and not the other three language speaking peoples. ... Hence
it may be observed that the terms 'Tamil Nationalism' and 'Dravidian Nationalism' were
synonymous" (K.Nambi Arooran - Tamil Renaissance and Dravidian Nationalism, Koodal
Publishers, Madurai, 1980)

The establishment of Annamalai University in Chidambaram and later the Tamil Isai Sangam
in Madras were manifestations of a rising Tamil self consciousness. The students at
Annamalai University were to become influential political leaders of the Tamil people in the
years to come.

As early as 1926, Sankaran Nair, a nominated member of the Council of State in Delhi,
pleaded for self government to the ten Tamil districts of the Madras Presidency, with its
own army, navy and airforce.

Scholar politician V. Kaliyanasundarar writing in 1929 urged that Tamil Nadu constituted a
nation within the Indian state. He declared that the correct English translation of the word
Nadu was nation and not land and pointed out that the early Tamils had their own
government, language, culture and historical traditions. (V.Kaliyanasundarar, Tamil Cholai,
Volume 1, Madras 1954)

In 1937, Periyar E.V. Ramasamy took over the leadership of the South Indian Liberal
Federation, commonly called the Justice Party. At the Justice Party confederation held in
Madras in 1938, Periyar Ramasamy put forward his demand for Dravidanad. This was two
years before Mohamed Ali Jinnah set out the formal demand for Pakistan at the Lahore
conference. In 1944, the Justice party changed its name to Dravida Kalagam and
C.N.Annadurai functioned as its first General Secretary.

These early manifestations of a Tamil national consciousness influenced Tamils outside India
as well. Periyar visited Malaysia in 1929, and his visit led to a proliferation of Tamil
associations, dedicated to religious and social reform - associations which were often led by
journalists and teachers. The writings of Annadurai and other leaders of the Dravida Kalagam
were avidly read by ordinary Tamils and marked a watershed in the literary heritage of the
Tamil people .

But, in the end, Periyar E.V.Ramasamy, the undoubted father of the Dravidian movement
failed to deliver on the promise of Dravida Nadu. E.V.R. failed where Mohamed Ali

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Jinnah succeeded. It is true that the strategic considerations of the ruling colonial power were
different in each case - and this had something to do with Jinnah’s success. But, nevertheless,
if ideology is concerned with moving a people to action, the question may well be asked: why
did E.V.R’s ideology fail to deliver Dravida Nadu?

Two aspects may be usefully considered. One was the attempt of the Dravida movement to
encompass Tamils, Malayalees, Kannadigas and all Dravidians and mobilise them behind the
demand for Dravida Nadu. Unsurprisingly, the attempt to mobilise across what were in fact
separate national formations failed to take off.

It was one thing to found a movement which rejected casteism. It was quite another thing, to
mobilise peoples, speaking different languages with different historical memories, into an
integrated political force in support of the demand for Dravida Nadu.

At the same time, the Aryan/Dravidian divide propagated by German scholars such as Max
Weber, encouraged by the British, and espoused by E.V.R. paid insufficient attention to the
underlying unity of India and the enduring links that the Tamil people had with the other
peoples of the Indian sub continent.

That was not all. E.V.R extended his attack on casteism to an attack on Hinduism - and
indeed to all religions as well. Periyar E.V.R threw out the Hindu child with the Brahmin
bath water.

E.V.R was right to extol the virtues of pahuth arivu, common sense. He was right to attack
mooda nambikai, foolish faith. His rationalism was often a refreshing response to religious
dogma and superstition. His attack on casteism, his social reform movement and his Self
Respect Movement in the 1920s infused a new dignity, thanmaanam, amongst the Tamil
people and laid the foundations on which Tamil nationalism has grown. The Iyer Heritage
Site serves to show that even today, the self perception of at least some Brahmins is that they
are "Aryans".

It was the pioneering work of EVR that led to the growth of the Dravida Munetra
Kalagam (DMK) led by C.N.Annadurai and later by M.Karunanidhi, to the All India Dravida
Munetra Kalagam led by M.G.Ramachandran and the Marumalarchi Dravida Munetra
Kalagam (MDMK) led by V.Gopalasamy.

But, having said that, the refusal of EVR to recognise that casteism was one thing, Hinduism
another and spiritualism, perhaps, yet another, proved fatal. His belligerent atheism failed to
move the Tamil people. In the result even within Tamil Nadu, EVR's Dravida Kalagam
became marginalised, and the DMK which was an offshoot of the Dravida Kalagam and the
ADMK which was an offshoot of the DMK, both found it necessary to play down the anti
religious line and adopt instead a ‘secular’ face. One consequence of EVR’s atheism was that
spirituality in Tamil Nadu came to be exploited as the special preserve of those who were
opposed to the growth of Tamil nationalism.

Furthermore, the anti-Brahmin movement tended to ignore the many caste differences
that existed among the non-Brahmin Tamils and failed to address the oppression
practised by one non-Brahmin caste on another non-Brahmin caste. It is a failure that
continues to haunt the Tamil national movement even today. Caste divides and

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fragments the togetherness of the Tamil people.

Support for the positive contributions that E.V.R. made in the area of social reform and to
rational thought, should not prevent an examination of where it was that he went wrong.
Again, it may well be that E.V.R. represented a necessary phase in the struggle of the Tamil
people and given the objective conditions of the 1920s and 1930s, E.V.R was right to focus
sharply on the immediate contradiction posed by 'upper' caste dominance and mooda
nambikai. But in the 21st century, there may be a need to learn from E.V.R. - and not simply
repeat that which he said or did.

Growth of Tamil national consciousness in Sri Lanka

In the island of Sri Lanka, the separate national identity of the Tamil people grew through a
process of opposition to and differentiation from the Buddhist Sinhala people. The Sinhala
people trace their origins in the island to the arrival of Prince Vijaya from India, around 500
B.C. and the Mahavamsa, the Sinhala chronicle of a later period (6th Century A.D.) records
that Prince Vijaya arrived on the island on the same day that the Buddha attained
Enlightenment in India. However, the words of the Sinhala historian and Cambridge scholar,
Paul Peiris represent an influential and common sense point of view:

"..it stands to reason that a country which was only thirty miles from India and which would
have been seen by Indian fisherman every morning as they sailed out to catch their fish,
would have been occupied as soon as the continent was peopled by men who understood how
to sail... Long before the arrival of Prince Vijaya, there were in Sri Lanka five recognised
isvarams of Siva which claimed and received the adoration of all India. These were
Tiruketeeswaram near Mahatitha; Munneswaram dominating Salawatte and the pearl fishery;
Tondeswaram near Mantota; Tirkoneswaram near the great bay of Kottiyar and
Nakuleswaram near Kankesanturai. " (Paul E. Pieris: Nagadipa and Buddhist Remains in
Jaffna : Journal of Royal Asiatic Society, Ceylon Branch Vol.28)

The Pancha Ishwarams of Eelam were important landmarks of the country and
S.J.Gunasegaram's 'Trincomalee - Holy Hill of Siva ' reveals the antiquity of Trincomalee as
an ancient Hindu shrine.

The Tamil people and the Sinhala people were brought within the confines of a single state
by the British. The struggle for freedom from British colonial rule, did lead Tamil leaders
such as Ponnambalam Ramanathan and Ponnambalam Arunachalam to work together with
their Sinhala counterparts in the Ceylon National Congress. But it was largely a dialogue
between the English speaking Tamil middle class and its English speaking Sinhala
counterpart.

Professor Kailasapathy in a paper presented at a Social Scientists Association Seminar in

"Both the reformers and the revivalists came from the Hindu upper castes, but while the

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former were not only English educated but also used that language for their livelihood and for
acquiring social status, the latter were primarily traditional in their education and used their
mother tongue for their livelihood and social communication.. .most of them wrote in
English... In doing so they probably had a particular audience in mind, an audience to whom
they wanted to prove the antiquity and greatness of their tradition...In contrast the revivalists
were mainly highly erudite in their mother tongue and wrote in it..."

The Pan Sinhala Executive Committee of the Ceylon State Council in 1936 and the formation
of the All Ceylon Tamil Congress led by G.G.Ponnambalam were some of the early
manifestations of the growth of a separate Sinhala nationalism and a separate Tamil
nationalism in the political arena of the island of Ceylon (as it then was known).

It was a Tamil nationalism which eventually found expression in the formation of the Ilankai
Thamil Arasu Katchi led by S.J.V.Chelvanayakam in 1949 and later in the 1970s in the Tamil
armed resistance movement, led today by the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam
and Velupillai Pirabaharan.

The 'thiyagam' of the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam, gave poignant expression to the
cultural values of the Tamil people, rooted in the Purananuru and Cilapathikaram. At the
same time, the armed resistance movement in Tamil Eelam, also brought about a fundamental
cultural transformation in Tamil society. It helped to break down casteism among the Tamil
people. It helped to liberate Tamil women from the structures of oppression that had been
deeply embedded in sections of Tamil society - and help create the Puthumai Penn that
Bharathy had sung about.

"The historical storm of the liberation struggle is uprooting age old traditions that took root
over a long period of time in our society... The ideology of women liberation is a child born
out of the womb of our liberation struggle... Our women are seeking liberation from the
structures of oppression deeply embedded in our society. This oppressive cultural system and
practices have emanated from age old ideologies and superstitions. Tamil women are
subjected to intolerable suffering as a consequence of male chauvinistic oppression, violence
and from the social evils of casteism and dowry." (Velupillai Pirabaharan, 1992, 1993)

That the armed resistance movement of the Tamil people should have originated in Tamil
Eelam and not in Tamil Nadu is not altogether surprising. It is the nature of the
discrimination and oppression which often determines the nature of the response.

"Liberty is the life breath of a nation; and when life is attacked, when it is sought to suppress
all chance of breathing by violent pressure, then any and every means of self preservation
becomes right and justifiable...It is the nature of the pressure which determines the nature of
the resistance." (Aurobindo in Bande Mataram, 1907)

Suffering unites a people and the suffering of the Tamil people in the island of Sri Lanka, in
their struggle for freedom and justice, has also served to bring together Tamils living not only
in Tamil Eelam and Tamil Nadu but also those living in many other lands. At the same time,
in Tamil Nadu poverty and corruption have weakened confidence in existing political
structures.

"As programmes and reforms failed... repression appeared as the direct method of dealing

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with peasant unrest. Between 1975 and 1982, the police forces launched a series of operations
against the Naxals. Either in what was called encounters or under police custody nineteen
young men died and about 250 people were jailed. The green turbanned peasants led by
Narayanaswamy Naidu launched agitations in 1972 and 1980. In Coimbatore, Dharmapuri,
South Arcot and Madurai there were serious disturbances.. Between 1972 and 1982 fifty four
peasants were killed in police firings and more than 25,000 were taken into
custody." (History of Tamil Nadu 1565 - 1982: Professor K.Rajayyan, Head of the School of
Historical Studies, M.K.University, Madurai - Raj Publishers, Madurai, 1982)

Indian Union & the Tamil nation

The Tamil cultural renaissance of the second half of the 19th century, the rise of the
Dravida Tamil national movement of the first half of the 20th century, and the armed
struggle for Tamil Eelam are but tributories flowing into one river - the river of the
growing togetherness of the Tamil people - and it is unlikely that this is a river that will
flow backwards.

Here, not many will question that the future of the Tamil people lies with the peoples of
India. In 1973, Kamil Zvebil, Professor in Tamil Studies at Charles University, Prague wrote
in 'The Poets and the Powers', of the Tamil contribution in shaping and moulding the great
Indian synthesis :

"...Many and variegated are the contributions of the Tamils of South India to the treasures of
human civilisation, the early classical love and war poetry, the architecture of the Pallavas,
the deservedly famous South Indian bronzes of the Chola period, the well known Bharata
Natyam dance, the philosophy of Saiva Siddhanta, the magnificent temples of the South - for
more than two thousand years have the Tamils been contributing to Indian culture and taking
part in shaping and moulding the great Indian synthesis."

Sylvain Levi George Coedes and La Valee Poissin wrote in the 'The Indianisation of South
East Asia' in 1975:

"Without being aware of it, India determined the history of a good portion of mankind. She
gave three quarters of Asia a God, a religion, a doctrine, a art. She gave them her sacred
language, literature and her institutions... All the regions contributed to this expansion and
civilisation, but it was the South that played the greatest role."

The Indian union in an emerging post modern world, will be a free and equal association of
states, that will be rooted in the heritage that the Tamil people, (whether they be from Tamil
Nadu or Tamil Eelam or elsewhere) share with their brothers and sisters of India - a shared
heritage that the Tamil people freely acknowledge. It is a shared heritage to which the Tamil
people have contributed and will continue to contribute - and from which the Tamil people
also derive strength.

Milestones in Tamil History UNESCO Courier, March, 1984

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"The Tamil Language is the official language of the State of Tamil Nadu (population over 48
million) in southeast India and is also spoken by some 4 million people living in Sri
Lanka, Burma, Malaysia, Indonesia, as well as parts of east and south Africa and islands in
the Indian Ocean, the South Pacific and the Caribbean.

There is a scholarly literature in Tamil dating back to the early centuries of the Christian era.
The language is of Dravidian origin. The Dravidians were the founders of one of the
world's most ancient civilizations, which already existed in India sometime before 1000 BC
when the Aryans invaded the sub-continent from the north.

The Aryans, who spoke the Sanskrit language, pushed the Dravidians down into south India.
Today 8 of the languages of northern and western India (including Hindi) are of Sanskrit
origin, but Sanskrit itself is only spoken by Hindu Brahman priests in temple worship and by
scholars. In southern India, 4 languages of Dravidian origin are spoken today. Tamil is the
oldest of these.

The History of Tamil Nadu begins with the 3 kingdoms, CHERA, CHOLA and PANDYA,
which are referred to in documents of the 3rd century BC. Some of the kings of these
dynasties are mentioned in Sangam Literature and the age between the 3rd century BC and
the 2nd century AD is called the Sangam Age. At the beginning of the 4th century AD the
Pallavas established their rule with Kanchipuram as their capital. Their dynasty, which ruled
continously for over 500 years, left a permanent impact on the history of Tamil Nadu, which
was during this period virtually controlled by the Pallavas in the north and the Pandyas in the
south.

In the middle of the 9th century a Chola ruler established what was to become one of India's
most outstanding empires on account of its administrative achievements (irrigation, village
development) and its contributions to art and literature. The Age of the Cholas is considered
the golden age of Tamil history.

Towards the end of the 13th century the Cholas were overthrown by the later Pandyas who
ruled for about a century an d were followed by the Vijayanagara Dynasty, whose greatest
ruler was Krishnadeva Raya (1509-1529), and the Nayaks of Madurai and *tanjore. The
Colonial Age opened in the 17th century. In 1639 the British East India Company opened a
trading post at the fishing village of Madraspatnam, today Madras, the capital of Tamil Nadu.
In 1947, India achieved Independence. The overwhelming majority of the population of
Tamil Nadu is Hindu, with active Christian and Muslim minorities.

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