Rettamalai Srinivasan


R. Srinivasan, also known as Rettamalai Srinivasan, was a Scheduled Caste activist and politician from the then Madras Presidency of British India. He is a Paraiyar icon and was a close associate of Mahatma Gandhi, remembered today as one of the pioneers of the scheduled caste movement in India.

Early life

Rettamalai Srinivasan was born in 1859 in a poor Tamil family in Madras Presidency. He was a brother-in-law of the famous scheduled castes activist Iyothee Thass. He worked as a translator in a South African court when Gandhi was practicing there as an advocate; he was instrumental in the father of the nation putting his signature in Tamil as "Mo.Ka. Gandhi".
Srinivasan established and led the Paraiyar Mahajana Sabha in 1891 which later became the Adi-Dravida Mahajana Sabha. He founded a Tamil newspaper called Paraiyan in October 1893 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 Rs. 100 for his writings.

Round Table Conference

Rettamalai Srinivasan represented the Paraiyars in the first two Round Table Conferences in London along with B. R. Ambedkar. In 1932, Ambedkar, M. C. Rajah and Rettamalai Srinivasan briefly joined the board of the Servants of Untouchables Society established by Gandhi In 1939, with Ambedkar's support, he established the Madras Province Scheduled Castes' Federation.

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.