Adi Dravida (or Adi Dravidar) is a term that has been used since 1914 in

South India South India, also known as Southern India or Peninsular India, is the southern part of the Deccan Peninsula in India encompassing the states of Andhra Pradesh, Karnataka, Kerala, Tamil Nadu and Telangana as well as the union territories of ...

to denote Paraiyars. At the time of the 2011 Census of India, they made up about half of

Tamil Nadu Tamil Nadu (; , TN) is the southernmost States and union territories of India, state of India. The List of states and union territories of India by area, tenth largest Indian state by area and the List of states and union territories of Indi ...

's Scheduled Caste population.

Origin

Iyothee Thass, a leader of the

Paraiyar Paraiyar, Parayar or Maraiyar (formerly anglicised as Pariah and Paree) is a caste group found in the Indian states of Tamil Nadu and Kerala and in Sri Lanka. Etymology Robert Caldwell, a nineteenth-century missionary and grammarian who w ...

community, believed that the term "Paraiyar" was a slur. He attempted a reconstruction of Tamil history, arguing that the Paraiyars were the original inhabitants of the land, who had been subjugated by upper-caste invaders. Another Paraiyar leader, Rettamalai Srinivasan, however, advocated using the term "Paraiyar" with pride, and formed the Parayar Mahajana Sabha ("Paraiyar Mahajana Assembly") in 1892. Thass, on the other hand, advocated the term "Adi-Dravida" ("Original Dravidians") to describe the community. In 1892, he used the term ''Adidravida Jana Sabhai'' to describe an organisation, which was probably Srinivasan's Parayar Mahajana Sabha. In 1895, he established the "People’s Assembly of Urdravidians" (Adidravida Jana Sabha), which probably split off from Srinivasan's organisation. According to Michael Bergunder, Thass was thus the first person to introduce the concept of "Adi Dravida" into political discussion. In 1918, the Adi Dravida Mahajan Sabha also requested the Indian government use the term to replace the current but pejorative term "Pariah" (Paraiyar) used for the community. Another Paraiyar leader, M C Rajah — a

Madras Chennai, also known as Madras ( its official name until 1996), is the capital and largest city of Tamil Nadu, the southernmost state of India. It is located on the Coromandel Coast of the Bay of Bengal. According to the 2011 Indian ce ...

councillor — made successful efforts for adoption of the term "Adi-Dravidar" in the government records. In 1914, the

Madras Legislative Council Tamil Nadu Legislative Council was the upper house of the former bicameral legislature of the Indian state of Tamil Nadu. It began its existence as Madras Legislative Council, the first provincial legislature for Madras Presidency. It was initia ...

passed a resolution that officially censured the usage of the term "Paraiyar" to refer to a specific community, and recommended "Adi Dravidar" as an alternative. In the 1920s and 1930s,

Periyar Erode Venkatappa Ramasamy (17 September 187924 December 1973), commonly known as Periyar, was an Indian social activist and politician. He was the organizer of the Self-Respect Movement and Dravidar Kazhagam and is considered the architect o ...

ensured the wider dissemination of the term "Adi Dravida".

Reservation

, Adi Dravida are considered as Scheduled Castes, under India's positive system of Reservation.

References

Citations Bibliography * * * {{refend Tamil society Dalit communities Scheduled Castes of Kerala Scheduled Castes of Tamil Nadu Scheduled Castes of Karnataka Scheduled Castes of Andhra Pradesh Scheduled Castes of Telangana