Chennai: Born in a tiny village in present-day Ariyalur district, the boy had to cover a distance of 40 km each day just to get to his school in Thittagudi in Tamil Nadu’s Cuddalore district. But that did not deter him.
He went on to secure his Bachelor’s degree in Chemistry from Presidency College, University of Madras, earning him the distinction of being the first graduate from his village, Anganur. Next was a Master’s Degree in Criminology from the Madras Law College, followed by a PhD in Victimology from the M.S. University in Tirunelveli.
The boy from Anganur is Dr Thol. Thirumavalavan, founder-president of the Viduthalai Chiruthaigal Katchi (VCK) or Liberation Panthers Party. He is one of only 28 MPs in the 18th Lok Sabha who hold a doctorate.
Of the 28, four were elected from Tamil Nadu — second only to Uttar Pradesh with five.
And of those four, two represent VCK, namely Dr Thirumavalavan and Dr D. Ravi Kumar; while the other two, Dr Thamizhachi Thangapandian and Dr Ganapathy Rajkumar, are from the Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (DMK).
For further context, of the 543 members of the 18th Lok Sabha, 147 are graduates, 98 are graduate professionals and 147 are postgraduates, according to the Association of Democratic Reforms (ADR). Among the 28 who hold doctorate degrees, all except two are from Forward Castes or Other Backward Castes. Dr Thirumavalavan and Dr Ravi Kumar, both from the Dalit community, being the two exceptions.
Asked how important a role education played in their lives, all four MPs from Tamil Nadu who hold doctorate degrees told ThePrint that it changed their worldview.
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VCK MPs with PhD
“Education alone can take you places and give you power and authority,” Dr Thol. Thirumavalavan, the third-time MP told ThePrint. “As I have always been with people, I can understand their day-to-day problems. But researching an issue on the whole by oneself gives a different dimension to what we have been thinking all these years,” he added.
His 2018 PhD thesis was titled “Religious conversion of Meenakshipuram Dalits — a victimological study”. It focused on why more than 150 Dalit families in a village in Tirunelveli district embraced Islam in 1981 and how it changed their lives over the years.
Prompted by alleged discrimination and violence by Forward Caste Hindus, the mass conversion, and its aftermath, forced the then AIADMK government in the state to order a Commission of Inquiry under a retired high court judge in 1982. The Commission submitted its report four years later and recommended enactment of a law to ban forced conversions. Its recommendation took the form of The Tamil Nadu Prohibition of Forcible Conversion of Religion Act, 2002 which was later revoked in the face of protests.
“Prolonged discrimination of Dalits in the locality pushed them to embrace Islam is what I could find,” Dr Thirumavalavan said, adding that he was not an advocate of conversion as a recourse.
He also said that socio-economic conditions of Meenakshipuram converts had improved, compared to Dalits in other parts of Tirunelveli. “I spoke to people of the village and spent as much time as I could to understand how the second and third generation of those who converted feel now. They are much more free from any sort of social discrimination.”
The only other VCK MP in the 18th Lok Sabha, Dr D. Ravi Kumar, is a native of Manganampattu village near Kollidam in present-day Mayiladuthurai-district. Born to a farming family, he too had to travel more than 10 km each day to Chidambaram to complete his school education. He went on to earn his Bachelor of Arts degree in Tourism Studies and later Bachelor of Law degree in 1984.
He then earned his Master’s degree in Tamil literature from Tamil University in 2010. By this time, he was already an MLA representing the Kattumannarkoil constituency.
Subsequently, he enrolled for a PhD at Annamalai University. His thesis — titled “Hidden History of King Nandan” — was based on the life of Nandanar, one of 63 Nayanars (Shaivite saints) who are believed to have lived in the 7th and 8th centuries.
“Nandanar was portrayed as untouchable in the Periyapuranam (Tamil epic), however, untouchability did not even exist in that period, as history tells us,” he told ThePrint, adding that the first recorded instance of untouchability can be traced back to the 11th Century.
He added, “In the inscriptions, we could see Nandanar as a king as well. More than literary evidence, inscriptions are our primary source of evidence for history.”
The two-time MP also explained there is a character similar to Nandanar in the epic Chidambara Mahatmyam. “We don’t know which one came first, whether the character from Chidambara Mahatmyam was added to Periyapuranam or the other way around.”
On the importance of education and why he opted to enrol for higher education in different stages of his life, he said, “Education has nothing to do with age. Education is everything for human beings.”
DMK MPs with PhD
DMK MP from Chennai South Dr Thamizhachi Thangapandian (T. Sumathy) is the third of four MPs from Tamil Nadu in the 18th Lok Sabha who hold a doctorate degree.
The daughter of two-time DMK MLA late V. Thangapandian, she earned her M.A. and M. Phil., in English Literature from Madurai’s Thiagarajar College and Kamaraj University, respectively.
She then went on to earn her PhD in English Literature from the University of Madras and also worked as a lecturer at Queen Mary’s College, Chennai, from 1996 to 2008.
The thesis of her PhD was “Diasporic Longing and the Changing Contours of Resistance in the plays of Ernest Thalayasingam Macintyre”.
Macintyre (89) is a Sri Lankan playwright living in Australia. Thamizhachi was inspired by his works, especially his contributions to theatre. Though she had earned her doctorate degree much earlier, her work on Macintyre was eventually published as a book titled Island to Island in 2013.
“Even at a young age, with my love for Sri Lankan Tamils, I was very impressed by the works of Macintyre. In his English plays, he exposed how Tamils were left helpless at the time of persecution,” she told ThePrint.
Thamizhachi added that she constantly felt the lack of a sense of belonging after she left her village near Mallankinaru in present-day Virudhunagar district to live in Chennai. “I could connect it with the feelings of our Tamil diaspora in Australia and other countries.”
The two-time Lok Sabha MP credited her professor T.V. Subba Rao for inspiring her thoughts on Tamil literature. “He insisted on learning literature written in our mother tongue first before reading foreign literature. It’s the time I became politically conscious.”
While most of her higher education was centred around the English language, all her literary works were in Tamil. “Writing in Tamil is my political statement. We are rewriting history that has always revolved around the Centre. Writing as an art form also shows my political stance,” she said, citing the example of Kenyan author Professor Ngugi wa Thiong’o.
Her message: “Education is the key to liberation.”
The other DMK legislator in the Lower House with a doctorate degree, Dr Ganapathy Rajkumar, is a first-time Member of Parliament who was formerly with the AIADMK.
After earning his Bachelor’s degree in English Literature, he secured his Master’s degree in Mass Communication before entering politics.
He joined the AIADMK in 1989 and became a municipal councillor in 2001. In 2014, he contested a bypoll and was elected mayor of Coimbatore.
His thesis, submitted when he was mayor, was titled “Evolution of Jayalalithaa as a mass leader”. Dr Rajkumar told ThePrint that for his thesis, he “documented how she (Jayalalithaa) evolved as a mass leader despite the hardships she faced as a woman”.
He added that Tamil history has ample examples of women leaders. “Women were leaders of Tamil families. After landholding came into force, power of women was gradually curbed. But they still found their place in every fight, including the Struggle for Independence against the British.”
Asked about the importance of education in his life, Dr Rajkumar said, “Education is the third eye which allows us to see the world, as it opens enormous opportunities to read the world in different perspectives.”
(Edited by Amrtansh Arora)
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