Marava & Ramnad · Eastern Coastal Plains
The risings in this region were pre-national and tenurial, and reading them backwards as nationalism misdescribes them. The chiefs who fought the Company between 1772 and 1801 were holders of palayams and chiefships, and the quarrel was over tribute, the right to keep troops and the right to collect in their own tracts; it was settled not by a battle but by the permanent settlement of 1801–03, which converted the office into a rent-collecting estate and ended armed resistance here for good. The Marava, Kallar and Nadar communities that appear in this history are named because the record names them, and their part in it is social and economic history — tenure, migration, trade, and the disabilities imposed by colonial law — not a matter for praise or blame. The region's twentieth-century contribution came through its port and its emigrants rather than through risings, and through campaigns for social reform.
Risings and revolts
Company forces attacked Kalaiyar Kovil in 1772 over arrears and the Sivaganga chief was killed. His widow, Velu Nachiyar, took refuge at Virupachi for eight years and returned in 1780 with support from neighbouring chiefs; the Maruthu brothers administered the recovered territory.
Outcome: Sivaganga was held by the line until it was drawn into the confederacy of 1801 and then settled as a zamindari.
A dispute over unpaid kist between the palayakkarar of Panchalankurichi, Veerapandiya Kattabomman, and the Company's collector escalated after a fatal encounter in 1798. A Company force under Major Bannerman took the Panchalankurichi fort in 1799 and Kattabomman withdrew into the country before being taken with the help of chiefs allied to the Company.
Outcome: Kattabomman was hanged at Kayathar on 16 October 1799 and his palayam was confiscated.
Kattabomman's brother Oomaithurai, released from confinement, joined the Maruthu brothers of Sivaganga and other chiefs in a confederacy that issued a proclamation at Tiruchirappalli calling on the palayakkarars to combine. Panchalankurichi was retaken by a Company force under Colonel Agnew after a siege in mid-1801.
Outcome: The Maruthu brothers were hanged at Tiruppathur on 24 October 1801 and Oomaithurai later the same year. Between 1801 and 1803 the palayams were converted into zamindari estates and the military tenure was abolished.
V. O. Chidambaram Pillai registered the Swadeshi Steam Navigation Company in October 1906 to run steamers between Tuticorin and Colombo in competition with an established British line. In February and March 1908 he and Subramania Siva addressed meetings during a nine-day strike at the Coral Mill in Tuticorin; both were arrested on 12 March 1908, and disturbances followed at Tirunelveli.
Outcome: Chidambaram Pillai was convicted of sedition and sentenced to transportation; the shipping company failed. He was released in December 1912 and his licence to practise was restored only later.
People
| Name | Years | Movement | Known for |
|---|---|---|---|
| Veerapandiya KattabommanPanchalankurichi, in the Tirunelveli palayams | c. 1760–1799 | Palayakkarar resistance | Palayakkarar of Panchalankurichi. He withheld the kist demanded by the Company, arguing drought, and resisted the Collector's attempts to assess and collect directly in his tract.Captured on 1 October 1799 and hanged at Kayathar on 16 October 1799. |
| OomaithuraiPanchalankurichi | died 1801 | Palayakkarar resistance | Kattabomman's brother; after his release from confinement he joined the Sivaganga chiefs in the confederacy of 1801.Executed in 1801 after the fall of Panchalankurichi. |
| V. O. Chidambaram PillaiOttapidaram; Tuticorin | 1872–1936 | Swadeshi | Barrister who founded the Swadeshi Steam Navigation Company in October 1906 to run a Tuticorin–Colombo service, and organised among the mill workers of Tuticorin during the strike of February–March 1908.Arrested on 12 March 1908 and convicted of sedition; the sentences were later reduced. He was set to work at the oil press in Coimbatore jail and released on 12 December 1912. He died at Tuticorin in 1936. |
| Muthulakshmi ReddyBorn at Pudukkottai; practised and legislated in Madras | 1886–1968 | Social reform; women's franchise | The first woman member of an Indian legislature, taken into the Madras Legislative Council in 1926 and elected its deputy president. She led the campaign for the municipal and legislative franchise for women, moved the bill to end the devadasi dedication system, and founded the Avvai Home in 1931.Resigned her seat in 1930 in protest at Gandhi's arrest. |
| U. Muthuramalinga ThevarPasumpon, Ramanathapuram | 1908–1963 | Congress; Forward Bloc | Campaigned from 1929 against the registration requirements imposed under the Criminal Tribes Act in this district, and convened a meeting at Abhiramam in 1934 demanding its repeal. Elected to the Madras Legislative Assembly for Ramanathapuram in 1937; joined the Forward Bloc on its formation in 1939 and organised Subhas Chandra Bose's reception at Madurai in September that year.Jailed for seven months from October 1938, and again for eighteen months from September 1940. |
People from Marava & Ramnad who resisted colonial rule, and the regional risings and revolts that shaped that resistance. (9)