Ten Things About Periyar Dravidian Parties Don’t Want You To Know

E V Ramasamy (1879-1973), popularly known as EVR, is hailed as ‘Periyar’ by his followers. He was a demagogue who used the social evils which were then prevalent, or perceived, as a capital for his propaganda. He was neither a rationalist nor a humanist. He was anti-Hindu and pro-British. By equating him to Bhimrao Ramji Ambedkar, many are doing a great disservice to the memory of Ambedkar, who was a great nation builder and a patriot.

Here are 10 facts which every Indian should know about EVR.

1. EVR advocated Nazi-style anti-Brahminism.

Many EVR apologists today indulge in the propaganda that EVR never advocated racial hatred against Brahmins. However, EVR was explicit in his agenda. The magazine he edited, published articles praising the ascendancy of Adolf Hitler and warned Brahmins in Tamil Nadu that they should learn from the plight of Jews in Nazi Germany and opt for course correction. Even after the fall of the Nazi regime, the approach of EVR, particularly when he addressed his cadre, was the same.

“Parpanan (a traditional honorific Tamizh term for twice-born, changed into a derogatory term by Dravidianists) should be driven away from this land,” EVR wrote on 29 January 1954. He further said, “However much a rationalist or atheist, if a person is a Brahmin he should not be allowed in our organizations” (20 October 1967).

A comrade of EVR’s, Ve Aanaimuthu revealed in his book that EVR told his cadre to rudely push away the Brahmin reporters when they came to his place. Sami Chidambaranar in his hagiography of EVR titled Tamizhar Thalaivar (“The leader of the Tamizhs”), writes:

2. The perception of EVR as a liberator of women is propaganda fiction.

While EVR is hailed as a great liberator of women, there is barely any evidence of him participating in the most crucial women’s rights movement of his time – the struggle for Sarda Act. Brought on by Hindutvaite Har Bilas Sarda, the Act was supported by both Ambedkar and Gandhi. It ultimately banished child marriage in a giant leap in the fight for women’s rights. Many women from Tamil Nadu too fought for this Act to come to fruition. But EVR was nowhere associated with this struggle. Even his hagiographers accept that he was a feudal playboy (called ‘minor’) who used to visit local brothels. In fact, a hagiographer hails the following incident as a great rationalist strategy:

In a much-circulated urban legend, EVR is said to have advised Dr Muthulakshmi Reddy, who was fighting for the abolition of the devadasi, advised her to counter Sathyamurthy in the legislative assembly with the argument that if being a devadasi was such a sacred position, then Sathyamuthy should start turning the women of his household/caste into devadasis. There is no archival or documentary evidence for this event. Further, this apocryphal urban legend belittles Reddy, who was more influenced by the Advaitic humanism of Sarada and Sri Ramakrishna and needed no advice from someone like EVR.

3. EVR was virulently anti-Scheduled Communities (SC).

EVR would clearly differentiate between SC non-Brahmins and non-SC non-Brahmins. He also made it clear that he identified himself with the welfare of non-SC non-Brahmins. He ranted in 1950 thus:

This hatred for the SC community often made him say things that would make any ordinary person cringe.

4. He defamed Ambedkar by saying he was bribed by Brahmins.

This hatred for the SCs ultimately, and naturally, started flowing towards Ambedkar, whose stand on India’s national unity further infuriated him.

Even a year after the parinirvana of Ambedkar, EVR attacked him bitterly.

With time, EVR’s hatred for Ambedkar increased. In his address on the occasion of Pongal in 1968, which was later published in his organisation’s official magazine, EVR accused Ambedkar of accepting “bribe from Brahmins in the form of reservation for his people (SC)” and saying the Constitution was made by the Brahmins.

5. EVR condemned Silappadikaram as Aryan propaganda tool.

In a speech made on 30 March 1951, EVR called Silappadikaram, the great Tamil epic written by llango Adigal, as “nothing but a propaganda tool of Aryans”. Condemning Tamil scholars who were conducting a seminar on the epic, he said:

Tamil scholar Ma Po Sivagnanam (Ma Po Si) defended Silappadikaram against such attacks by EVR. In a rebuttal he penned against EVR, Ma Po Si wrote:

6. EVR had a love-hate relationship with Thirukkural and likened it to excreta.

EVR at one time (1948) praised Thirukkural, like every Dravidianist did, saying it was all rational and anti-Hindu. However, by 1950, he wrote that he also used to condemn Thirukkural as having thoughts contrary to rationalism. And people asked him if the Tamil text too would be gone, what book they would have left. “And I answered them thus: 'I am saying remove the excreta emanating bad smell from the room. And you are asking me if we remove this excreta what should we place in its place?’” (Viduthalai, 1 June 1950)

7. EVR “the economist” said prices of clothes had increased because SC women had started wearing jackets.

SC leaders in Tamil Nadu have for long accused EVR of saying, contemptuously, in a meeting that the cloth prices had gone up because the ‘Pariah’ caste women started wearing jackets. In 1963, many Ambedkarite magazines in Tamil Nadu had reported this speech. Anbu Ponnoviam, a venerated historian who had meticulously documented the lives of SC leaders and spiritual personalities, had written that as a keen observer of EVR from 1939, he was one of those who were shocked when he heard EVR offering Pariah women wearing jackets and Pariah men becoming literate as reasons for the rise in cloth prices and unemployment (Nasthikam, 2 March 1963).

A Chennai-based magazine, Ambedkar, in its 1963 November-December issue, pointed out that despite SC leaders strongly condemning EVR’s statement. The proof for the statement came from Dravidianists themselves when the Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (DMK) magazine Murasoli published a cartoon highlighting the anti-SC mindset of EVR.

8. EVR sought the help of the British and Jinnah for his Dravidstan. But both treated him as a useful idiot.

It is a well-known fact that EVR and his movement were pro-British and they also supported the Muslim League in its pro-Pakistan demand. In an interview to a Tamil magazine, Anantha Vikatan, in 1965, EVR expressed how he had hoped that, given the pro-British stand of their movement, the British would hand over the authority to the Justice party. In his own words, “I went and told the British that it was not British honesty to hand over the power to them while we are the ones who have always supported you. The British smiled and said that they now knew only Hindu-Muslim difference and not Brahmin non-Brahmin difference. Then I went and saw Jinnah and asked for his help. He said that your bed (plan) looks good but it lacks the legs to stand on. And he told that only I had to look after my problem. The media wrote that Jinnah had tar-brushed the face of EVR.”

9. Kamarajar, the tallest nationalist non-Brahmin leader from Tamil Nadu, never accepted the racist and anti-Hindu views of EVR.

EVR apologists again indulge in propaganda and many have come to even believe that Kamarajar had respect for EVR and his worldview. In reality, Kamarajar consistently opposed EVR’s worldview. When EVR and his cohorts opposed the conference on Silappadikaram, Kamarajar, who attended and supported the conference, criticised the stand of EVR and his Dravidian movement.

Even when EVR expressed his support for Kamarajar in the 1957 election, Kamarajar came out with a statement. Sociologist Llyod Rudolph explains:

Then chief minister Kamarajar passed a new Dramatic Performance Act. It was specifically aimed at stopping the obscenely racist anti-Ramayana plays which M R Radha, a disciple of EVR, was staging. Later, when DMK came to power defeating Kamarajar, EVR in a speech before his death expressed his happiness at the defeat of Kamarajar.

10. EVR could never bring himself to condemn the massacre of landless SC labourers by non-Brahmin land owners in Keezhvenmani, Tamil Nadu.

On 25 December 1968, a group of 44 women and children, the families of SC agricultural landless workers striking for a wage hike, were burnt to death by henchmen of non-Brahmin landlords in a village in Thanjavur district of Tamil Nadu. EVR, in a statement condemning the incident, called it the result of a communist conspiracy against the then ruling DMK government. He said:

PS: I thank author and historian Sri Ma Venkatesan, the leader of state SC division of the Bharatiya Janata Party, who wrote The Two Faces of E V Ramasamy Naicker (Tamil, 2004). The sections on EVR’s views on Tamil literature, his hatred towards the SC people and his propaganda against Ambedkar are based on that book.