1906 - Mahakavi Bharathiyar: sings lofty praises on Chettinad Youth for their involvement in “Hindu Madhaabhimana Sangam”. Excerpt from [http://www.puducherry.com/bharathiar/] below:
The fact that the Mahakavi was in Karaikudi and showered praise gladdened me. When I realized that he sung in particular about us, “Dhanavanigar”, made my heart brim with pride … and why not, when the Mahakavi himself speaks highly of our virtues like philanthropy and truthfulness, we should all be proud of our ancestors….
So, I began exploring the relationship between Bharathiyar and Karaikudi. What I encountered made my heart trace a sine wave…. It fell from the top floor of Bhurj Khalifa to the dismal abyss of a Hawaiian Trench, rising back to the top floor of Bhurj Khalifa (just wondering if man would ever invent such a roller coaster!!)…. And I encountered that in the most unlikely places on the internet… Wikipedia!! [The more I try to dismiss Wikipedia as an unreliable source, the more I start to believe what it says!!)…. Yes, it cites an article from THE HINDU (1927) under the entry “Karaikudi” where none other than Mahatma Gandhi rips apart those very traditions that we think make us unique…. My idea of Mahatma Gandhi had always been one of a self-sacrificing, soft natured man with kind words for his pupil, until now…. This article changed everything… It’s quite long, so I recommend you to have some patience and be prepared for a cruel onslaught on the so-called “all-sugary”, “righteous” and “philanthropic” life of our ancestors…and don’t forget to climb back to Bhurj Khalifa at the end.. am waiting there…
1927 - Mahatma Gandhi speaks at Karaikudi
Source: The Wikipedia
- on September 25, 1927 {This speech is of historical importance as one of the greatest personalities of our time, M. K. Gandhi spoke at length on the characteristics of the people and land of Karaikudi in 1927. The contents are very much relevant today. If you are visiting this site for the first time please take time to read the speech}
“FRIENDS,
I thank you for address and the different purses, the chief purse containing over Rs. 4,000. It is a good purse but not good enough for the people of Chettinad and it is certainly not good enough, when I compared it to the seventeen-rupee purse given to me by the Adi-Dravida boys. You can well afford to give four times as much whereas the Adi-Dravida boys could hardly afford to give as much as they have given. Nevertheless I am thankful for whatever you have been able to give for Daridranarayana out of a willing heart.
I wish to start my remarks by repeating the offer I made yesterday, at last night's meeting. I want to expose to you this beautiful piece of art prepared in your own place, and the yarn of this beautifully fine muslin which I call khadi was spun by Mr. Sjt Chokkalingam Chettiar of this place. I had the pleasure of seeing the very different processes through which he passed his cotton before he could draw his thread so fine as the threads from which this khadi piece is woven. And if you had witnessed his handicraft you would have envied with me and with me you would have also been proud of his art. I cannot make any personal use of so fine a piece of muslin. If therefore I cannot evoke your love of local art and love of the country, I must take this piece away and put it among the exhibits of the All-India Spinners' Association. But I would really like you to possess this piece of cloth. If you will do so, you have to pay a fancy price for it. Works of art all the world over carry always fancy prices and I have fixed the reserve price of this piece of cloth at Rs. 1,000; but you may, if you wish, ask what is the artistic value about this piece of cloth or in other words you may, if you wish, enquire why is it that I value khadi so much as I do.
I was told by one who has lived in your midst for years that there are in Chettinad many people who do not understand the message of the spinning-wheel nor do they understand how all these purses are to be utilized. I propose to devote a few sentences by way of explanation of the message of the spinning wheel. It is designed to provide work for millions of starving men and women who are living in the seven hundred thousand villages of the land. Everyone who knows anything about India has testified that they have no work for nearly six months in the year and apart from the spinning-wheel it is impossible to find work for these millions of people, and so, through the spinning-wheel we can produce sufficient cloth to cover the whole of India. And I venture to suggest that anything produced by the hands of starving millions such as this muslin is necessarily a work of art. All art that is true and living must have some correspondence to the life that we live. True art must not debase life but it must sustain and ennoble life. And now you understand why I prize khadi so much. But it would be valueless if you and I do not wear khadi. Now I shall tell you something about the organization which is producing khadi and selling it. here are 1,500 villages at least being served through this organization. In these 1,500 villages over fifty thousand sisters are receiving the benefit of the spinning-wheel and through this spinning-wheel nearly five thousand weavers are weaving the yarn spun by these fifty thousand women. Side by side with these spinners and weavers a class of men has been brought into being who do the special laundry work that is required in connection with the khadi as also dyeing and printing.
The whole of the beautiful art of printing and dyeing which had become extinguished in Masulipatam and elsewhere has now been revived and has been given an honorable place. It was through this organization that over seven lakhs of rupees were distributed amongst a network of workers. And if it is of any consequence to you to know, let me inform you that the vast majority of these artisans are non-Brahmins. This organization is being conducted and controlled by a council of nine men, the majority of whom are again non-Brahmins, if you want to know that. Its president is a non-Brahmin who is miscalled Mahatma. (Laughter.) Its treasurer is again a non-Brahmin whose qualities as a treasurer are not to be surpassed by any treasurer on the face of the earth and its secretary is another non-Brahmin, the son of a distinguished banker in Bombay. This organization is finding work for nearly 1,000 middle class men, the majority of whom are again non-Brahmins. It has also some workers who not only get no honorarium whatsoever but actually feed this organization. All the accounts of the central organization as also provincial organizations are periodically audited and those account may be inspected by friend and foe, donors or non-donors. No official of the organization gets more than Rs. 175 per month. No man or woman can approach this organization or belong to it unless he or she is dominated by a spirit of self-sacrifice.
When I mentioned women, I have pleasure in informing you that there are several distinguished daughters of India who are working for this khadi, free of charge. For instance I may mention the three granddaughters of the Grand Old Man of India and the distinguished sisters belonging to the great Petit family. The organization is operating with a capital of about 20 lakhs of rupees. But great as these figures may appear to you to be they are nothing when compared with what you and I should want them to be. If the khadi spirit possesses the whole of India we should be serving not 1,500 but 7,00,000 villages and not fifty thousand spinners but one hundred million spinners. It is for this work that I ask the rich people of Chettinad not to give me some portion of their superfluity but a substantial portion of their substance. You may also now understand that when I put the reserve price Rs. 1,000 upon this beautiful piece of khadi I rather underrate than overrate. Now I must repeat in a hurried fashion some of the most important local matters about which I have been talking during the last four days of my pleasant stay in your midst.
I do urge you to look after your sanitation and your water-supply. Your palaces do not look to advantage at all in the midst of unsanitary streets and tanks full of not pure sparkling water but foul water. I can show you how you can do these things at an incredibly small expense, not out of your capital but out of your savings.
I understand that some of your marriage customs are very bad. There is very often a price put upon the head of a bride as much as Rs. 30,000. I understand that you do not hesitate to spend as much as Rs. 50,000 per marriage; but this custom I consider to be immoral. There can be no price put either way in the matter of such a sacred contract as marriage. It must be as easy for a poor man to get a virtuous bride as for a rich man. Merit and mutual love are the sole tests for marriage contracts. The expenses for marriage ceremonies, though I do not consider them to be immoral, I regard them as a criminal waste. It is not becoming of a rich man to dangle his wealth before the multitude in the fashion in which he very often does.
The art of amassing riches becomes a degrading and despicable art if it is not accompanied by the nobler art of how to spend wealth usefully. So, out of this marriage reform alone and putting a wise restraint upon your extravagance on these ceremonies, you can turn this Chettinad into a fairyland. You can have if you will, without much effort, public parks, recreation grounds, water-works and profitable dairies that will give supply of cheap and pure milk to the poor people living in your midst.
And as I tell you as a man of experience and as a fellow Chetti that you treble your earning resources if you conserve your health by wise sanitation, by an absolutely pure supply of water and by ensuring pure milk for the rich and the poor. A lady doctor writing to me tells that I should remind you about the immoral custom that is prevalent in Chettinad and that prevents you from thinking of these things of public usefulness. She tells me that the rich people of Chettinad had a due share in perpetuating a hideous immoral custom of assigning girls of tender age to a life of shame under the name of religion. She tells me that there are many Devadasis in your midst. If this is true it is really a matter for hanging our heads in shame. Let not possession of wealth be synonymous with degradation, vice and profligacy.
And is it not a tragic irony that, in spite of these vices, you are also spending money lavishly in erecting what you flatter yourselves to believe as temples for gods to reside. Not every structure made of brick and mortar labeled temple is necessarily a temple. There are, I am sorry to say, many temples in our midst in this country which are no better than brothels. Do you know that in our religion it is not possible to call any single place a temple unless elaborate ceremonial of purification has been made inside that building and unless the spirit of God has been invoked by men full of piety, so that God may reside in that? And so, I would urge you to restrain yourselves and not lavishly spend in building temples but in the first place dedicate your own bodies to the service of God and for that reason first of all purify by ridding yourselves of the evils to which I have drawn attention.
But I am glad to be able to inform you that I received only today a gratifying letter in which whilst the writer admits most of the evils to which I have referred just now he tells me that there are in your midst several noble-minded Chettis rich enough not only in gold but in treasure of virtue also. He tells me that there are in your midst several brahmacharis going on with their godly life in a silent manner. He also tells with hope and pride that several young men were conducting against heavy odds a reform movement and I assure these young men that whilst the path of reform is not all roses and that, whilst it is bestrewn with countless thorns, success is theirs if they will persevere prayerfully and with a pure heart. I understood that they are gradually trying to solve one very difficult question that faces every one of you.
I understood that a rigid custom has grown up in your midst whereby no Chettiar going either to Burma, Singapore or Ceylon takes his wife with him. I regard this bar sinister against your womanhood as a double drawback and a great sin. It exposes you when you leave homes to avoidable temptations and it deprives your life partners for a number of years of the privilege of your companionship and the opportunity of broadening their outlook by traveling to distant lands with yourselves. I wish these young men therefore very early success in their chivalrous fight and I urge the elders, to whom my voice may reach, to give every assistance to the young men in their endeavor to carry on the necessary reforms in your midst.
And now that silence prevails in this meeting and as this is perhaps the last meeting in Chettinad that I shall address, I should like to say a few words to the sisters in front of me. I am glad to see so many of you attending this meeting. I am afraid you have no notion that this message of khadi is a message principally devoted to the betterment of the condition of your starving sisters living in thousands of villages. I do not know how much men in India will have to pay for keeping you, the women of India, in darkness about so many things of the highest importance in life, both to men and women. But thanks to God that since the advent of the movement for reviving the spinning-wheel, thousands of women have learnt to come out of their homes and listen to the music of the charkha.
And I would love to think that you, the women of Chettinad, had begun to think beyond the threshold of your houses or palaces. I would like you to realize the deep and distressful poverty of millions of your sisters and I would like you independently, apart from your men, to part with your possessions, your rupees and your jewellery for the sake of these sisters and it fills me with gladness to be able to tell you that the response from the women of India has been spontaneous so far as this message is concerned and they have even given their moneys and jewelleries willingly and in many cases lavishly. But to give me money or your jewellery is by no means enough. If you will establish a living bond between yourselves and your starving sisters, it is absolutely necessary for you to discard your foreign fineries and adopt khadi permanently for your wear; because, if you do not wear the products of their labors, all the money that you give for khadi is a waste of effort. The beauty of a virtuous woman does not consist in the fineness of her dress but in the possession of a pure heart and virtuous life.
Millions of men and women all over India early in the morning invoke the blessed and immortal name of Sita in order that her name may surround them during the whole day with her protecting power, not because Sita wore costly jewels but because she bore a heart that was of pure gold and purer diamond. Sita did not remain in her palace when Rama went into banishment but she insisted upon accompanying him through all these eventful years of exile. Sita did not consider Nishadaraja, whom in our ignorance we consider today, to be untouchable but Sita embraced Nishadaraja and accepted with a grateful heart the services he nobly rendered. And I would like you to imitate Sita's virtues, Sita's humility, Sita's simplicity and Sita's bravery. You should realize that Sita for the protection of her virtues did not need the assistance of Rama, her Lord and master. The chronicler of the history of Sita and Rama tells us that it was the purity of Sita which was her sole shield and protection. And if you will but recognize the power that resides in your breast it is open to you by force of your purity, love and spirit of self-sacrifice to bend the haughty spirit of your men and shame them into forsaking the life of vices and debauchery. I would like you to develop the courage to insist upon accompanying your husbands wherever they go. May God give you that strength and goodwill. I am now very nearly done and as is usual at all meetings I must follow the custom here also of asking those who have not yet contributed to this purse to do so if they believe in khadi and if they wish it. I would also urge those men and sisters here to give if they wish as much as they can and therefore if there are those who have not really given enough I would like them if they believe in the statistics I have given and in the importance of the message of khadi not to be niggardly but give generously.
[after this,] the auction of the jewels, silver cups and rings, etc., presented to Mahatmaji commenced. Mr Shanmugam Chettiar announced that he was willing to give for the muslin cloth presented to Mahatmaji at Devakottah his (Mahatmaji's) own fancy price of Rs. 1,000. . . . A small ring which was presented to Mahatmaji for a second time worth not even 10 rupees fetched a fancy price of Rs. 135. Gandhiji became responsive to the mood of the audience exhibited during the course of the auction and was touched by their boundless affection for him and addressed a few words after the auction, a thing unusual. [end]
[Prepare to be Skyrocketed!!!!!!!]
Gandhiji continued: I shall never forget the scene. This will remain as one of the pleasantest memories in my life. I have had many a pleasant and unpleasant experiences in my life outside and this will remain among the very few pleasant remembrances and especially so because I have been saying ever since I have set my foot in Chettinad many unsavoury things to you. You might have easily misunderstood my word and my motive. But I have seen that the more harsh words I have spoken, the greater the affection you have showered on me. You have received me as a blood brother and taken the words I have said exactly in the spirit I have delivered them to you. That is really my joy. But I would like you not to forget the words that I have spoken to you but I want every word I have said to you to penetrate your hearts and if I hear that the word having remained in your heart has fructified I think it would give me much greater joy than if you give me millions. I have no use for your money except to serve you with it and it is a strange thing but it is true that I cannot serve you even with your own money if you do not give me your hearts. And so in order that your money which is in my possession may bear ample fruit I request you to do what I have asked you to do. You know that if you can do that, it will do good to you, it will do good to me and also the whole of India. May God bless you and give you the power to understand my message and act up to it.”
Source: The Hindu, 27-9-1927
Well, if you managed to come this far, a small Post Script,
PS: By the time India got Independence in 1947, the extent of Chettinad Philanthropy had already begun to show its true enormity, because that was the time the education development went to its peak when, Vallal Alagappar established the Alagappa Arts College, Alagappa Chettiar College of Engineering and Technology (A.C.C.E.T.), and Alagappa technical institution and school. He was the key person in establishing the Central Electro Chemical Research Institute (C.E.C.R.I.) in 1948 at Karaikudi by providing land and funding.
****** Ciao on my next post (if it happens, that is) *********
