Nine Hundred Year Historical Perspective of
how Tamil Nadu lost its Sovereignty and How Selfish Politicians are selling out Tamil National Rights Today
Part II
Thanjai Nalankilli
TAMIL TRIBUNE, February 2002 (ID.2002-02-02)
Current issue of the magazine:
http://www.geocities.com/tamiltribune/
Definitions
:
Hindians: People whose
mother tongue is Hindi; much of Bihar, Chhattisgarh, Jharkhand, Madhya Pradesh, Uttaranchal, Uttar
Pradesh, and
some surrounding areas in northern India is their homeland. Hindian politicians
control and dominate the Indian government because they form the single largest
block in the Indian parliament.
Abbreviations
AIADMK- All India Anna Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam
BJP - Bharatiya Janata Party
CBSE - Central Board of Secondary Education
DK- Dravida Kazhagam
DMK- Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam
MDMK- Marumalarchi Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam
Outline
Part I (already published. Click here)
1. Introduction
2. Feuds within the Dravidian Parties
3. Brief Sinhala Occupation of Parts of Tamil Nadu in the Twelfth Century
3.1 History
3.2 Lessons to be Learned
Addendum 1: Emerging Sinhala Aggressiveness towards Tamil Nadu today
Part II
4. Malik Kafur's Invasion of Tamil Nadu in the Fourteenth Century
5. Tamil Nadu under Sultans, Nayaks, Maharashtrians, Nawabs and others
5.1. Overview of History
5.2. Kizhavan Sethupathi's Rebellion against Madurai Nayaks
6. Tamil Nadu under British Rule
6.1.Overview of History
6.2. Maruthu Pandyar's Rebellion against the British
6.3. The British Indian Empire
The article continues (and ends) in Part III (to be published in April or May 2002 issue of
TAMIL TRIBUNE)
4.
Malik Kafur's Invasion of
Tamil Nadu in the Fourteenth Century
Chola kings who dominated Tamil Nadu for over two
centuries (approximately 950 AD to 1200 AD) waned, and Pandya kings had the
upper hand for the next century (approximately 1200 AD to 1300 AD). End of the Pandya dynasty as a major force, and in fact the end of
Tamil Nadu as sovereign nations ruled by Tamil kings
of the Chera, Chola and Pandya dynasties, came about because of internal
squabbles again within the Pandyan royal family. Tamil Nadu is yet to recover
the lost sovereignty!
King Maravarman Kulasekhara Pandyan (1268 - 1310) had
two sons Jatavarman Sundara Pandyan and Jatavarman Veera Pandyan. The elder son,
Sundara Pandyan, was by the king's wife and the younger, Veera Pandyan, was by a
mistress. Contrary to tradition, the king proclaimed that the younger son would
succeed him. (www.geocities.com/tamiltribune) This enraged Sundara Pandyan. He killed the father and became king
in 1310. Some local chieftains in the kingdom swore allegiance to the younger
brother Veera Pandian and a civil war broke out . Sundara Pandyan was defeated
and he fled the country. He sought help from the far off northern ruler Sultan
Ala-ud-din Khilji who was ruling much of northern India from Delhi. At
that time, his army under General Malik Kafur was in the south at Dvarasamudra
(far to the north of Tamil Nadu). Khilji agreed to help Sundara Pandyan and
ordered Malik Kafur's army to march to Tamil Nadu. With Sundara Pandyan's
assistance, this Muslim army from the north entered Tamil Nadu in 1311. The army
engaged in murder, rape and looting as it passed through Tamil Nadu. Many
historians believe that Malik Kafur in Dvarasamudra was not planning to march
south all the way to Tamil Nadu, and that, but for Sundara Pandyan's request to
Sultan Ala-ud-din Khilji, he would never have invaded Tamil Nadu. Thus the first
invasion of Tamil Nadu from Delhi was a direct result of the internal quarrel in the
Pandyan royal family. As we would see, the result of this invasion was
devastating to Tamil Nadu; Tamil Nadu lost its sovereignty and
continues to be an enslaved nation even after almost 700 years.
Once inside Tamil Nadu and his army well entrenched
with not much opposition, Malik Kafur turned on Sundara Pandyan also, whom he
came to help. The latter fled Madurai to southern Pandya Nadu. Malik Kafur
looted Madurai also. Sultan Ala-ud-din Khilji and Malik
Kafur never intended to conquer and hold Tamil Nadu as part of the Delhi
Sultanate; looting Tamil Nadu was their aim all along. So, having accomplished
what he came for, he did not occupy Tamil Nadu but turned back north. (Sundara Pandyan's uncle Vikrama Pandyan
did win a couple of battles against Malik Kafur but many historians do not
believe it to be the reason for Malik Kafur leaving Tamil Nadu. Whatever the
reason, Malik Kaur left with his loot.) His army was in Tamil
Nadu for only a few months. During this period he gathered (looted) gold,
precious stones, horses and elephants from the Tamil land. He is said to have
taken over 90,000 maunds of gold, unspecified numbers of jewelry
and famed Pandyan pearls, 23,000 horses and 612 elephants.
This was the very first time Tamil Nadu was
plundered by a ruler from Delhi. Today, some 700 years later, after so many
invasions by so many foreigners (as we would see in Section 5), Tamil Nadu is
once again being "robbed" of its wealth by the new Hindian
rulers in New Delhi. The Hindian dominated Government of
India that came into existence in 1947 transfers quietly billions of rupees
every year from Tamil Nadu State to the Hindi states by a variety of
governmental mechanisms, such as unfair allocation of fiscal grants to
states, unfair allotment of Indian Government sponsored industry and
infrastructure development in various states, unfair import-export policies and
taxation policies for various industries (favouring industries centered in Hindi
states and nearby regions), etc. This is discussed in some detail in Reference 1
listed at the end of this article. The "mode of transferring
wealth" has changed but the effect is the same. Malik Kafur took the wealth
in sacks of gold and boxes of jewels. Today's Hindian dominated Indian
Government takes the wealth through sophisticated fiscal policies that favor
mostly Hindi states. Malik Kafur took the gold and jewels at the point of the
sword. Today the Indian Government enforces its biased fiscal policies
by the barrel of the gun. Any group that opposes the biased fiscal
policies that rob not only Tamil Nadu but also many other non-Hindi states, are
bloodied and butchered as we see in Punjab, Assam, Nagaland, Mizoram, Tripura and
other areas that seek to redress the "robbing" of their wealth.
Dravida Munnetra Kazhaga (DMK) leaders in their early
days used to say "Vadakku Vazhkirathu, Therku Thaeikirathu"
("north lives and south languishes"); When they said north, they of
course were referring to the north-central regions of the Hindi states. Today
DMK leaders are more interested in their personal selfish gains than in safeguarding the interests of Tamil Nadu. Wealth of
some powerful Tamil Nadu politicians have multiplied a hundred times in a short period of time but the Tamil people are impoverished
as ever as their wealth is being transferred to Hindi states slowly year after
year. Some economists have concluded that, but for the burden of subsidizing
Hindi states, states like Tamil Nadu, Andhra Pradesh, Karnataka, Punjab,
Maharashtra, etc. might have reached a standard of living comparable to
Singapore and Malaysia.
5.
Tamil Nadu under Sultans, Nayaks, Maharashtrians, Nawabs and others
5.1.Overview
of History
Ever Though Malik Kafur left Tamil Nadu with the
looted wealth in 1311, the Tamil nation laid devastated and demoralized. Tamil
Nadu would never recover from it fully and achieve its past glory. The lost
sovereignty was yet to be recovered. The historic
division of Tamil Nadu into three dynastic rules of Cheras, Cholas and Pandyas
was no more. Neither the Cholas nor the Pandyas were strong monarchs any more.
In the years between the Chola heydays and Malik Kafur invasion, Chera Nadu had
transformed itself into Kerala and slowly drifted away from Tamil mainstream. It
developed its own cultural and linguistic identity, although Kerala has strong
affinity to Tamil Nadu in both culture and language even today.
After Malik Kafur left Tamil Nadu, there were couple of
more invasions from the Delhi Sultans. Much of Tamil Nadu became part of Sultan
Mohammad-bin-Tughlug's empire of the Delhi Sultanate for a brief period
(approximately 1327 to 1335). Then the local commanders of the Delhi Sultanate
rebelled against him and established their own rule as independent Madurai
Sultanate (or Ma'bar Sultanate). Thus the Delhi rule over Tamil Nadu ended in less than 8 years.
Madurai Sultanate fell to the Vijayanagar Emperor and
much of Tamil Nadu was annexed to the Vijayanagar Empire. This was a southern
empire and did not include northern India. Soon some Vijayanagar commanders in
Tamil Nadu rebelled against the emperor and established their own
"kingdoms" in Tamil Nadu. These commanders are Telugu Nayaks. Thus
began the "kingdoms" of Madurai Nayaks, Thanjai Nayaks and Ginjee
Nayaks. Nayak rule gave way to Maharashtrian rule. These Maharashtrian invaders
conquered and ruled much of Tamil Nadu for a while. Again, the Maharashtrian invaders
ruled Tamil Nadu as a separate entity and not part of any northern empire. About
this time Aurangzeb, the Moghul Emperor from Delhi, invaded Tamil Nadu and
annexed much
of it to his Delhi-based empire. This was the second time Tamil Nadu came under
Delhi rule. This lasted for only a few years. The local Mogul commanders
rebelled against
Aurangzeb and established themselves as independent rulers (Nawabs). Thus
started the Nawab rule over Tamil Nadu. After the Nawab rule, Europeans came to
power in various parts of Tamil Nadu. European rule (primarily British rule) over Tamil Nadu
lasted for
almost two centuries. We will discuss European rule in Section 6. It is worth
noting that, before the British rule, Tamil Nadu
was ruled from Delhi as part of some type of Indian empire for only about ten
years
(first during the Delhi Sultanate of Mohammad-bin-Tughlug
and then during the Moghul Empire of
Aurangzeb).
Thus from the time of Malik Kafur invasion to British
rule, Tamil Nadu was under an assortment of foreigners, namely, the Sultans,
Vijayanagars, Nayaks, Maharashtrians and Nawabs. Even during this time of foreign
rule, some parts of Tamil Nad were independent of foreign rule and were under Tamil
chieftains for brief periods of time. At times they ruled under the tutelage of
foreign rulers and occasionally declared themselves independent and carried on
for brief periods until defeated by foreigners. Always some type of in-fighting
was at least part of the reason for the defeat of the independence-minded Tamil chieftains. We will
briefly examine the case of one such Tamil chieftain.
5.2. Kizhavan
Sethupathi's Rebellion against Madurai Nayaks
During the time of Telugu Nayak rule over Tamil Nadu,
Tamil chieftains known as "Sethupathi" ruled Ramanathapuram (Ramnad).
They usually paid tribute to Madurai Nayaks but occasionally refused to pay and
declared themselves independent. Kizhavan Sethupathi (Raghunatha Devar) ruled
Ramanathapuram between 1670 and 1710. He replaced the mud walls around his
capital to stone walls and also dug a moat around it to protect it from enemy attacks. He
built a strong
army with as many as 40000 soldiers at its peak. Then he not only refused to pay tribute to the
Madurai Nayaks but also attempted wrestle control of Madurai from Nayaks. His
first two attempts, during the reigns of Chockanathar Nayak and Third Veerappa
Nayak, ended in failure not because the Nayaks defeated him but because of
internal dissentions in his own Ramanathapuram. He had to interrupt his Madurai
campaign and come home to put down the internal dissentions. We see here again
the same scenario. It is internal quarrels in Pandya dynasty that brought in
foreign rule to Madurai in the fourteenth century. Now it is internal dissentions in Ramanathapuram that
helps the continuation of foreign rule over Madurai. (Kizhavan Sethupathy did capture Madurai during the days
of Rani Mangammal (Nayak) but the Nayak soon recaptured it.)
The
famed Madurai City that was the capital of the ancient Pandya dynasty and the
home of the Third Tamil Academy (Third Tamil Sangam or Third Tamil Kazhagam) that brought us some of the
greatest jewels of Tamil literature went under foreign rule in the fourteenth
century, and Tamil people are yet to regain full sovereignty over this ancient
Tamil city. Tamil Nadu State Government cannot do anything (even put up a stone
carving or statue) near some of the ancient historical sites in Madurai (as well
as other historical sites in ancient cities like Thanjavur (Thanjai or Tanjore))
without getting permission from the Indian Government located couple of thousand
miles away and dominated by politicians who do not know of Tamil history or
culture. In fact, the Indian Government refused permission to the Tamil Nadu
State Government to install a statue of Emperor Raja Raja Cholan near the
Thanjai Big Temple (Thajavur Peria Koil) that the emperor built (see
Reference 2). Will we accept if the British were to tell us what we can or
cannot do in Madurai or Thanjavur? Will Hindians accept if the British were to
dictate what can or cannot be done in Delhi or Agra or other historical places in the
Hindi belt?
6.
Tamil Nadu under British Rule
6.1.Overview
of History
The Portuguese, the Dutch, the French and the British
came as traders from Europe. Tamil Nadu was then a fragmented nation with many
Nayaks, Nawabs and other local chieftains. The traders became rulers because
some local rulers sought their help against others and the Europeans soon became
their masters and demanded tribute. Those who obeyed were allowed to rule, those
who refused were militarily defeated (with the help of other local chieftains)
and their land handed over to other more subservient rulers or direct European
rule was established. Eventually the British took control of all of Tamil Nadu with
the exception of the small Pondicherry territory under the French. Pondicherry
remained under French rule until the early 1950s.
It is not possible in this short article to go through
the twisted history of the British conquest of Tamil Nadu, involving shifting
alliances, betrayals and back-stabbings (not much different from today's
politics). We will however discuss very briefly the life of one Tamil king who
resisted the British valiantly but in the end fell.
6.2. Maruthu
Pandyar's Rebellion against the British
Maruthupandyar (Maruthu Pandyar) ruled Sivagangai
during the last part of the 18-th century. He became the ruler of Sivagangai
which was paying tribute to the British. He continued to pay tribute for many years.
Eventually he rebelled against the British and issued an Independence
Proclamation from Thiruchi Thiruvarangam Temple on June 10, 1801. He called
on the other local rulers to join hands with him and fight the British. While
some did, others supported the British.
Maruthu Pandyar and his allies were quite successful
and captured three districts from the British. Seeing the deteriorating
situation, the British brought in additional troops from Britain. They also got
more troops from the British garrisons in the neighboring Ceylon (now called Sri
Lanka). Pudukottai and Ettayapuram rulers also sent their armies to help the
British. These forces surrounded Maruthu Pandyar's army at Kalayar Koil, and the
latter scattered. Maruthu Pandyar and his top commanders escaped. They
regrouped and fought the British and their allies at Viruppatchi, Dindugal and
Cholapuram. While they won the battle at Viruppatchi, they lost the other two
battles. Maruthu Pandyar was captured at Cholapuram. He was hanged on October
24, 1801. He was the last Tamil ruler in Tamil Nadu to fight the British. The
British conquest of Tamil Nadu was complete; all the local rulers paid tribute
to them.
Maruthu Pandyar's 1801 Independence Proclamation was
the first such proclamation against the British. But you will not find any
mention of it or of Maruthu Pandyar in Indian History texts funded or approved
by the Government of India. Those books center about the Hindi heartland and
nearby regions. History of regions farther from it, be it the northeast or the south, are
ignored. Generations of students from outside of Tamil Nadu come out of school
without knowing anything about Tamil Nadu while we are taught all about the
northern kings and their exploits. In fact, history texts used at Indian
government affiliated schools (CBSE
schools) located in Tamil Nadu teach little about Tamil Nadu. Thus even students from these Tamil
Nadu schools come out without knowing the history of Tamil Nadu. This is the sad
state of Tamil Nadu in the post-British era. We will discuss it more in Section 7 (Part III).
Some Tamil Members of Parliament requested the Indian
Government to issue a postage stamp to commemorate the 200-th anniversary of the
hanging of Maruthu Pandyar in October 2001.The Indian Government said it had to
study it. They are still studying. The Indian Government took much less time to
decide to test a nuclear bomb than to study whether to issue a postage stamp
honoring Maruthu Pandyar! This government had issued postage stamps in
honor of Jhansi Rani and other northern monarchs who rebelled against the
British (and lost). Maruthu Pandyar fought the British (and lost) decades before
Jhansi Rani but the Indian Government would not issue a stamp in his honor.
Tamils are only third class citizens in this post-British India under Hindian
rule. We will discuss it more in Section 7 (Part III).
6.3. The
British Indian Empire
As mentioned in the previous subsection, with the
defeat of Maruthu Pandyar, Tamil Nadu became totally under the control of the
British. Some areas were ruled by chieftains who paid tribute to the British and
others were governed directly by the British. Soon all of Tamil Nadu (with the
exception of the French controlled Pondicherry) became part of the British
Indian Empire ruled from Delhi. Except for the eight years under the Delhi
Sultanate of Mohammad-bin-Tughlug and couple of years under the Moghul Empire of Aurangzeb,
Tamil Nadu was never part of any type of Indian Empire before. Tamil Nadu
remained part of the British Indian Empire until 1947 when the British left.
End of Part II.
We expect to publish Part III in the April or May 2002
issue. March issue is reserved for another subject. We will discus in Part III the Hindian
rule over Tamil Nadu in the post-British India. Don't miss it.
REFERENCES
1. Economic
Discrimination of Tamil Nadu
2. Why is Emperor Raja Raja Cholan Standing outside the Thanjai Big
Temple?
NOTE: Tamil and other names are sometimes
spelled differently by different authors. Here are some variations of spellings
of names used in this article:
Ala-ud-din - Alauddin, Alaudin, Alaudhin
Madurai - Mathurai, Madura, Mathura
Pandya - Pandia, Pandiya
Pandyan - Padian, Pandiyan
Veera Pandyan - Veerapandyan, Veerapandiyan, Veerapandian
Chockanatha - Chockanathar
Cholapuram - Chozhapuram, Chola Puram
Devar - Thevar
Dindugal - Thindugal, Thindukal, Dindukal
Ginjee - Ginji, Senjee, Senji
Jhansi - Jansi
Kalayar Koil - Kalayarkoil, Kalayarkovil
Khilji - Kilji, Kiljhi
Kilzhavan - Kilavan
Kulasekhara Pandyan - Kulasekharapandyan, Kulasekharapandiyan, Kulasekharapandian
Ma'bar - Mabar
Malik Kafur - Malik Kapur, Malikafur, Malikapur
Maruthu Pandyar - Maruthupandyar, Maruthupandiyar, Maruthupandiar
Maruthu Pandyan - Maruthupandyan, Maruthupandiyan, Maruthupandian
Moghal - Mogal, Mughal
Mohammad-bin - Mohammadu-bin
Nayak - Naik, Nayakar
Pondicherry - Pondichery
Pudukottai - Puthukottai
Sethupathi - Sethu Pathi, Sethupathy, Sethu Pathy
Sivagangai - Siva Gangai, Shivagangai
Sundara Pandyan - Sundarapandyan, Sundarapandiyan, Sundarapandian
Thanjavur - Thanjavoor
Thiruchi - Trichi, Thiruchirapalli, Trichirapalli
Thiruvarangam - Tiruvarangam (also called Srirangam, Sri Rangam)
Tughlug - Thuglug, Thughlug
Vijayanagar - Vijaya Nagar
FN020308
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