Diwan Bahadur Rettamalai Srinivasan (7 July 1860 – 18 September 1945), commonly known as R. Srinivasan, was a scheduled caste activist and politician from then

Madras Presidency The Madras Presidency or Madras Province, officially called the Presidency of Fort St. George until 1937, was an administrative subdivision (province) of British India and later the Dominion of India. At its greatest extent, the presidency i ...

British India The provinces of India, earlier presidencies of British India and still earlier, presidency towns, were the administrative divisions of British governance in South Asia. Collectively, they have been called British India. In one form or another ...

(now the

Indian state India is a federal union comprising 28 states and 8 union territories, for a total of 36 subnational entities. The states and union territories are further subdivided into 800 districts and smaller administrative divisions by the respe ...

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 ...

). He is a Paraiyar icon and was a close associate of

Mahatma Gandhi Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi (2October 186930January 1948) was an Indian lawyer, anti-colonial nationalism, anti-colonial nationalist, and political ethics, political ethicist who employed nonviolent resistance to lead the successful Indian ...

and was also an associate of B. R. Ambedkar. He is remembered today as one of the pioneers of the Scheduled caste movement in India. He founded the Adi dravida mahajana sabha in 1893. Cotextualizing scheduled caste Movement in South India, Pg 10

Early life

Rettamalai Srinivasan was born on 7 July 1860 (or 1859) in a poor Tamil family in Madras Presidency. Thirumavalavan 2003, Pg xxvi His family was able to send him to a residential school in

Coimbatore Coimbatore (Tamil: kōyamputtūr, ), also known as Kovai (), is one of the major Metropolitan cities of India, metropolitan cities in the States and union territories of India, Indian state of Tamil Nadu. It is located on the banks of the Noyy ...

because of his father Rettamalai's trade relations with the British. He was the only Paraiyar student among the 400 pupils in the school. He then worked as an accountant at Ooty which was then the summer capital of the Madras presidency. Ooty was brimming with Dalit political activism then and Srinivasan grew interested. He was a brother-in-law of the famous scheduled castes activist Iyothee Thass. He worked as a

translator Translation is the communication of the meaning of a source-language text by means of an equivalent target-language text. The English language draws a terminological distinction (which does not exist in every language) between ''trans ...

in a South African court when Gandhi was practicing there as an advocate; he was instrumental in Mahathma Gandhi putting his signature in Tamil as "Mo.Ka. Gandhi" (

Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi (2October 186930January 1948) was an Indian lawyer, anti-colonial nationalist, and political ethicist who employed nonviolent resistance to lead the successful campaign for India's independence from British ru ...

in Tamil). Thirumavalavan 2004, Pg 227 Srinivasan established and led the ''Paraiyar Mahajana Sabha'' in 1891 Thirumavalavan 2004, Pg 44 which later became the ''Adi-Dravida Mahajana Sabha''. He founded a Tamil newspaper called ''Paraiyan'' in October 1893 Thirumavalavan 2003, Pg xxvii which started selling as a monthly with four pages for the price of four annas. However, ''Paraiyan'' experienced great difficulties in its early days. Srinivasan was a participant in the freedom movement and an arrest warrant was issued against him claiming that he was fleeing the nation. In 1896, a case was filed against the newspaper and Srinivasan was dragged to the court citing a letter to the editor. The editor Srinivasan was fined 100 for his writings.

Round Table Conference

Rettamalai Srinivasan represented the Paraiyars in the first two Round Table Conferences in London (1930 and 1931) along with B. R. Ambedkar. Cotextualizing Dalit Movement in South India, Pg 29 In 1932, Ambedkar, M. C. Rajah and Rettamalai Srinivasan briefly joined the board of the Servants of Untouchables Society established by Gandhi. In 1936, he established the Madras Province Scheduled Castes' Party. In the Round Table Conference, he shared the dais with Ambedkar and continued to have interaction with him. But, he differed greatly with Ambedkar on the question of untouchables converting to other religions. In the Yeola Conference in 1935, Ambedkar thundered "I was born as a Hindu, I solemnly assure you that I will not die as a Hindu". Rettamalai Srinivasan said, " Depressed Classes are not in the Hindu fold. They are full blooded Dravidian in race". In 1936 he was conferred to the title of ' Diwan Bahadur' by British government for his service to Depressed Classes.

Memorials

Commemorative stamps have been issued in memory of Rettamalai Srinivasan by the Department of Posts of the Government of India. Cadres of the Viduthalai Siruthaigal party claimed to have discovered the remains of the Paraiyar leader in Otteri and constructed a memorial over his mortal remains and named it ''Urimai Kalam''. On 6 July 2011, Chief Minister J Jayalalithaa had directed that his birth anniversary on 7 July be observed as a government function and ministers to honour him by garlanding his statue located inside Gandhi Mandapam, Chennai. His grandson B. Parameswaran became a minister in the Government of Tamil Nadu and a member of the Indian parliament.

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Early life

Round Table Conference

Memorials

Notes

References

Further reading