Dravida politics is out of date

Secular front? That’s a new one for the rabidly regional DMK. Some people wondered whom M. Karunanidhi would talk to in the Tamil Nadu ...

Secular front? That’s a new one for the rabidly regional DMK. Some people wondered whom M. Karunanidhi would talk to in the Tamil Nadu Congress, with the virulently anti-Amma Elangovan removed as working president by the party high command. But shouldn’t the Congress — after losing three important states in the semi-finals to the General Elections — be asking: who, in Tamil Nadu will listen if Karunanidhi talks? For what does he offer the Tamil voter but stale ideology? Isn’t this the DMK that deployed high melodrama to capture the public imagination at a time when national identity was still fragile and cut it up into regional pieces? Isn’t this the DMK that ran up its own flag in 1967 and wanted to secede from the Indian Union? Isn’t this the DMK that kept Tamil Nadu disadvantaged by cutting it off from the north? (Not that the people of Tamil Nadu didn’t have reason to fear the bigoted Hindi pracharaks let loose by Rajendra Prasad). And isn’t this the DMK that has always had only two planks with which to manipulate the highly emotional Tamil public: anti-Brahminism and ethnic Tamil pride? Even now in 2004?

Back in the fifties, they even tried to tear out the religious heart of Tamil Nadu. Elders recall how a DMK sympathiser, film comedian N. S. Krisnan had a sequence in which one man led off: “Andha Ganapatikku tondi perithavidam yeppadi yenraal…” (That Ganapathi’s paunch got so fat because…). The ‘choir’ would cap the line with “Kozhakattei thinnadinale, anney, anney!” (…of eating modaks, brother, brother!). But the public has remained largely devout and dismissive of these blasphemies. In 1984, the Tamil lexicon set by Madras University froze English spelling in ‘Dravidian’ format. Shiva became civa, Swaminatha became caminata and siddhar became cittar. Outside Tamil Nadu, who knew — or cared? Such artificial moves to leach out the wicked north (whose sins were doubly compounded as the ancient source of Sanskrit and the modern source of Hindi) resulted in a kind of cultural isolation for ethnic Tamils unimaginable in a modern state — and tragically unnecessary.

The assonant beauty of Tamil poetry does not need such angry filters, nor can any paan-chewing Hindi chauvinist ever hope to lift his eyes to the magnificence of this language that belongs with Sanskrit, Chinese, Greek and Latin in the exclusive and tiny club of the world’s classical languages. In a twist to history, the ancient Tamil classics that neo-Dravidians claim with such ferocity, were rescued from oblivion mainly through the efforts of Tambrahm scholars deeply attached to the language and culture that they had been part of for over two thousand years. So the whole edifice of ‘Tamil-swallowing Brahminism’ is built on a lie and finally wrinkled into its true, shabby dimensions when TN, uncaring, voted in a Brahmin chief minister. Tamil Nadu’s hottest poet-lyricist Vairamuthu (original songwriter for Roja, Sapnay and other superhits), who was born to a poor farming family and became an ardent Tamil scholar, said in an interview to this paper, “Why should I hate Brahmins? Their learning and discipline is inspirational. Today I would say ‘Brahminism’ is simply a lifestyle choice that is one among others. So what’s left to hate?” What began as social purpose is nothing but shrill, empty talk, like Mayawati’s allying with manuvadis.

Story continues below this ad

Meanwhile today’s Tamilian is less paranoid about ethnic identity and more connected with his huge country. TN (and Punjab) collected the maximum money for Gujarat relief. In Arunachal, in Jaisalmer, in darkest Srinagar, idli-sambar-vada is there to stay. Tamil pop rules film music. Gurgaon flaunts restaurants called ‘Simply South’. Tamil men have married Kashmiri women and Punjabi ‘mundas’, Tamil ‘penn’; it’s been mix-and-match in urban India for two generations. Even purely Punjabi parents have named their firstborns ‘Mannan’ (’king’ in Tamil). The fact is, while the DMK has stayed frothing hatred for Brahmins and the north, the people of India have quietly found each other and bonded. Fifty years together as a people do that: shared battles, blights, victories and, yes, so much success coming out of progressive, hardworking South India.

A corruption-tainted ‘amma’ who transfers officers on whim is hardly the ideal captain of the Tamil kappal (ship). But her bold ration card reforms and anti-conversion laws have found favour in TN, despite Karunanidhi’s incessant ‘arikkai’ (critiques) on Sun TV. Is the Congress really going to ally with a party like the DMK that has not had a fresh idea in decades, except hate for fellow-Indians… and love for the LTTE?