Kamaraj - A Noble Political stonemason

In the beginning of the 20th century, the vast majority of the Nadar community were suppoters of Self Respect Movement, parties supproting the downtrodden and suppressed Nadar community under the leadership of WPA. Soundarapandian : the first President of Thandai Periyar’s `Suya Mariyadai Iyakkam’. It’s not without reason that the ’self-respect movement’ of the Justice Party and Dravidian parties succeeded in Tamil Nadu, and its various manifestations ruled the roost at the height of the socio-political churning of the society.

The nawab of Arcot giving away revenue collection rights to the British East India Company in the mid-eighteenth century meant that a region with no great kings or kingdoms came under the British rule. And along the way, jobs-on-merit at the hands of the alien ruler meant equal opportunity for equal talents in a race for the survival of the fittest.

If the need for societal spread made the non-brahmin movement adopt education and employment as its `equaliser-slogans’, the attainment of this goal, first with the formation of the Justice Party and more so with that party’s coming to power in the 1919 elections, made the movement itself near-redundant. The Communal G O of 1921 and its later-day modifications, all formalising and legitimising the non- brahmin movement’s demands for reservations in education and employment, benefited only the non-brahmin upper castes initially.

The intermediary castes and the harijans, the later-day backwardsand the scheduled castes respectively — to whom education and hence, non-farming, formal employment — were alien, were left mostly untouched.

It was thus left to `Periyar’ E V Ramaswami Naicker to take the non-brahmin movement to the masses, a decade and a half after Gandhi had succeeded in doing so with the Congress movement.

If the Justice Party could fill the political vacuum and use its own presence to ensure equality in education and employment for the non-brahmin upper castes, `Periyar’ necessarily had to demythify the social status of the brahmins drawn mainly from religious edicts.

Once the `brahmin question’ was settled, then naturally came the divisions within the non-brahmin segments.

The `Periyar factor’ and the post-Independence socio-economic reforms, particularly during the chief ministership of the late K Kamaraj has since ensured the spread of education to all social grades, economic well-being and consequent social awareness among the lower strata of the non- brahmin segments

Later with the influence and charisma of Kamaraj, even his own community in South Tamilnadu began to switch over from Self-Respect Movement to enmass support to Congress movement in the late stages of freedom struggle and then during Congress Rule in the state.

The evolution of Legendry Mass Leader of Poor:

K. Kamaraj was humble and poor in a backward area . He belonged to one of the most depressed castes of Hindu society. His schooling lasted only six years. He was barely fifteen when he heard of the Jallianwala Bagh massacre which was the turning point in his life.

Kamaraj became an able organiser in mobilizing people for public meetings addressed by patriots. Appreciating his skill, Satyamurthi took him under his fold.

He worked hard for the cause of the freedom movement, unmindful of his personal comfort or career.

He was eighteen when he responded to the call of Gandhiji for non-cooperation with the British. He carried on propaganda in the villages, raised funds for Congress work and took a leading part in organising meetings.

A pre-Independence party like the Congress which had nothing to offer to its cadres exceptsuffering and imprisonment under the British rule, became the home for Kamaraj. In April 1930, Kamaraj joined the Salt Satyagraha Movement at Vedaranyam and he spent most of his youth in jail.

He grew fond of books and through nteractions with intellectuals in prison Kamaraj developed his leadership skills that proved a valuable asset to him as an administrator in later years