Pulavar Kaliyaperumal, Vathiyar of Viduthalai-2, nurtured Naxalism

Icon of his times: Pulavar Kaliyaperumal of Pennadam recalled his life as a revolutionary in his memoirs, Makkal Thunaiyodu Maranathai Vendren.
|Image source: Special arrangement

Director Vetrimaran’s film “Viduthalai-2” evokes memories of the period more than fifty years ago when many parts of Tamil Nadu came under the control of the Maoist Naxalbari movement. Vijay Sethupathy plays Perumal Vathiyar, the hero of the film, who resurrects Pulavar Kaliyaperumal in Pennadam, The latter was a Naxalite leader who later became a Tamil nationalist and was sentenced to death for murder along with his son Valluvan. Five other members of his family were sentenced to life in prison.

According to The Hindu Archives, District and Sessions Judge TN Singaravelu sentenced prominent Naxalite leaders Vathiyar alias Kaliyaperumal and Valluvan to death. Another accused in the case is Nambiar, another son of Kaliya Perumal. Rajamanikkam and Arumugam (his close relatives); Masilamani and Ananthanayaki (his brother and sister-in-law).

Slogans praising Mao Zedong

As Kaliya Perumal and others were led into the court hall, he shouted slogans praising Chinese revolutionary Mao Zedong and calling for agrarian revolution and armed uprising. According to The Hindu, he shouted “Long live the Naxalbari Movement” immediately after the verdict was announced. The case relates to the killing of Ayyaperumal, whom Kaliyaperumal accused in his memoir Makkal Thunaiyodu Maranathai Vendren or Conquering Death with People’s Support (Senthee Publishing House) of being a police informant. Prawal’s version is that he sent engineering student Tamilarasan to kill Ayyamperumal with a pitchhuva. “When the police arrived at the scene, Ayyamperumal was still alive. But they left him dead so that they could implicate my family in the murder,” he wrote.

A division bench of the Madras High Court confirmed Praval’s death sentence but commuted the sentence of his son Varuvan on the grounds that he was only 21 years old and committed the crime at the instigation of his father and might develop respect for the law. habits over time. The judge refused to change the life sentence of another defendant.

Thanks to the efforts of former mayor Krishnamurti, Praval’s death sentence was commuted by President Giri. Pulavar, best known for his work as a Tamil teacher, was released at the age of 60 after 13 years in prison. He died on May 16, 2007.

Kaliyaperumal studied Pulavar course (Tamil course) at the college run by Veera Saiva Mutt in Mailam. When the college authorities insisted that students apply holy ash on their foreheads, Kaliya Perumal and his friends came to the college carrying Vaishnavite symbols to express their protest.

Start as a teacher

After working as a teacher for a while, he quit his job and devoted himself full-time to political activities. He was a member of the Communist Party of India (CPI) and later the Communist Party of India (M) and worked as a sugar mill worker in Pennadam. “I was expelled from the CPI(M) for reading the Naxalite magazine Puratchi Puyal. Comrades like Apu had already advocated armed struggle at the 1965 CPI(M) conference in Madurai and The party was urged to lead the anti-Hindi agitation,” joining the Naxalite movement and the Communist Party of India (Marxist-Leninist). In 1969, he became the deputy secretary of the party’s Tamil Nadu unit.

Charu Majumdar, the founder and general secretary of the Communist Party of India-Marxist-Leninist, visited the state twice and advocated the elimination of landlords, moneylenders and public land encroachers, prompting the Naxalites in Tamil Nadu to take direct action action.

As the film depicts, Prawal was a revered figure who challenged the government and the police as the Naxalite policy of eliminating class enemies led to a series of deaths. These events also resonated in the Tamil Nadu Assembly. The then chief minister M. Karunanidhi said his government would not tolerate violence from any quarter. In his memoirs, Prawal was highly critical of the DMK government and Karunanidhi.

It was a time of Naxalite upsurge. Three people – Churchill of Tuthukudi, Ganesan, a chemical engineering student of Annamalai University, and Kanyappan of Udumalai Petatei – accidentally made the bomb at Kaliya Perumal Coconut Grove Killed in explosion. Prawal, who was monitoring the movements of strangers, was seriously injured. “I told them there was no need to use bombs. But they insisted that they needed them because Ganesan faced threats from DMK-affiliated students,” Kaliyaperumal said. They were buried in sugar cane fields. When the issue was raised in Parliament, Karunanidhi said the body had been exhumed and police were investigating the case. Prawal recalled in his memoirs that Churchill asked him not to conduct bomb experiments before he died. In the film, Watiyar also said that he decided to give up the path of violence after the deaths of three comrades. Kaliya Perumal continued to pursue a policy of violence and extermination. Ayyamperumal’s killing was in line with this policy. But it was Tamira Rasan who was later killed during a bank robbery in Pompalapi.

‘Unspeakable repression’

Kaliya Perumal, in a conversation with writer SV Rajadurai, said that he and his family had supported the killing of Ayya Perumal so that Tamira Rasan could continue working among the people. “I suffered a lot of torture and repression. I escaped from the gallows. My family had to endure endless repression for my political beliefs. As a revolutionary, I think these are just ordinary problems.