Dravidian Movement and Aryan Illusion

The remarks made by Tamil Nadu Governor RN Ravi last week, Aryan-Dravidian differences due to geographical and not racial, provide remarkable insight into the contemporary political situation. Unlike other governors in non-Bharatiya Janata Party-ruled states, Sri Ravi has advanced ideologically. belongs to Tamil Nadu Dravidian political ideology are inseparable and the comments made by Mr. Ravi should be viewed with some concern. While such interference by un-elected governors in non-BJP ruled states has become par for the course, it is imperative to look closely at the merits and veracity of the claims raised by Mr. Ravi, as they tend to modify well-established views. . India self.

linguistics and race

The statements made by the Governor, initially at a function commemorating the Vellore Sepoy Mutiny and then repeated at a function at Madurai Kamaraj University, can only be described as historical negationism. In the past, various leaders have strongly opposed the Aryan migration theory and have blamed the British for the emergence and development of the Aryan-Dravidian distinction. By getting into this heated ideological battle, Sri Ravi has attempted to shake up the political discourse in Tamil Nadu.

However, what is noteworthy is that Mr. Ravi is not the first to make such claims. In fact, in his book bunch of ideasMS Golwalkar, the second chief of the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh, saw the Arya-Dravidian distinction as a regional sect. By doing so, Golwalkar attempted to position the Aryans as native to the Indian subcontinent in the ‘Out of India Theory’ – which is now widely discredited by academics. Nevertheless, the issues raised by Golwalkar and now Mr. Ravi should be taken seriously not because they are backed by academic rigor, but because they challenge the idea of ​​India. The Indian subcontinent boasts a rich and diverse history that includes multi-ethnic origins, and is established by intense scholarship on linguistics, mythology, folklore and anthropology, archaeology, geology, big history and genetics. It was based on these academic activities that linguistic studies established the uniqueness of the Dravidian language family (Telugu, Kannada, Malayalam, Tulu, Tamil and so on).

Robert Caldwell in his seminal work, A comparative grammar of the family of Dravidian or South-Indian languages (published in 1856) has presented empirical evidence of the non-Sanskrit origin of the Dravidian languages. Success in understanding linguistics was not an isolated event. With this came the rise of a Tamil Renaissance movement which enabled a culture of political consciousness founded on rationalism and inspired by social justice. Thinkers such as Ayotithas Panditar, Manonmanyam Sundaram Pillai and MS Poornalingam Pillai as well as leaders of the ‘Justice Party’ of later days such as Dr TM Nair, P Thiagarai Chetty and Dr C Natesa Mudaliar supported the socio-political call for liberation. . of non-Brahmins. Thus, these circumstances collectively gave rise to the idea of ​​what was to become the Dravidian movement – ​​which took shape formally on November 20, 1916, at a meeting at the Victoria Public Hall in the then Madras city. in the book, Pre-Aryan Tamil Culture (published in 1985), PT Srinivasa Iyengar establishes the existence of Dravidian culture using Sangam-era literature.

archaeological evidence

The existence of a unique, pre-Aryan population with a distinct cultural heritage and developed literary traits has been fortified by archaeological evidence collected from the Harappa and Mohenjo-daro excavations in the early 1920s, and the ongoing Tamil Kishjhari This has been further substantiated by excavations. Nadu. With modern-day advances in handling delicate biodegradable materials and high-throughput genomic sequencing from excavation sites, we now understand how the Indian subcontinent was settled through waves of migration.

Read also | Governor’s intention was to raise Arya-Dravidian issue: Veeramani

These studies corroborate historical facts that have come to common understanding in Tamil Nadu during the century-old Dravidian movement. In 2018, a paper titled ‘The Genomic Formation of South and Central Asia’ (co-authored by 92 scientists across different disciplines) further confirmed that Aryans were migrating to the subcontinent between 2000 BC and 1000 BC. Scientific work published thereafter also established that the Harappans of the Indus Valley Civilization brought about an agricultural revolution in the subcontinent and limited the period of Aryan migration to 2000 BCE and 1500 BCE.

a theory rejected

Recent scientific findings have conclusively rejected the ‘Out of India Theory’, which is part of a larger narrative that suggests that Dravidians and Aryans are ethnically similar but geographically divided. This has posed serious problems for Golwalkar’s supporters, who, without taking into account the research to discover the recently lost, mystic river Saraswati, and to reproduce the Indus Valley Civilization as the ‘Saraswati Civilization’ , which suggests that the Harappan language may have been Dravidian/Proto-Dravidian. As such, CN Annadurai (Anna), a veteran of the Dravidian movement and former Chief Minister of Tamil Nadu, in his book anticipated such a baseless position, Arya Maya (Aryan illusion).

Anna, based on the teachings of Periyar EV Ramasamy, structured a socio-political discourse against superstitions, false beliefs and fake history. Dravidian leaders, including Kalaignar M. Karunanidhi, complemented their social policies with academic rigor, scientific temper and rational thinking – these became the benchmarks of Dravidian politics. Even when political differences arose between the Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam and the All India Anna Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam, its leaders did not compromise on the core values ​​of the Dravidian movement and their firm beliefs in opposition to caste-based social structures.

‘Dravidian Model’

It is, therefore, not surprising that Tamil Nadu Chief Minister MK Stalin has supported state interventions to address inequalities and create a fair ecosystem for all to thrive; He called it the ‘Dravidian model’. It is also a fact that the Chief Minister presented a book titled Dravidian model, to the governor. The book, authored by economists Kalaiyarasan A and Vijayabhaskar M, provides a detailed, empirical explanation of the modern political economy of Tamil Nadu.

During the remainder of his stint in Tamil Nadu, Sri Ravi could find, in addition to the books cited here, a number of other books that provide nuanced evidence of how India’s languages ​​were shaped by waves of migration; and how streams of social movements arose to speak libertarian ideologies in different languages ​​to make India a multi-source civilization. Any other theory that the governor may face should be viewed with skepticism as the overwhelming evidence supporting the migration of Indo-European speakers, called Aryans, some 4,000 years ago.

Manuraj Shunmugasundaram is an advocate in the Madras High Court and the spokesperson of the Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (DMK).