The media is full of the sad story of an inter-caste marriage gone awry ending in a mysterious death. A line of thought is that the young man in question being of a lower caste than his bride had everything to do with it. And yet such instances are not new to Tamil Nadu.
The first was the marriage of Jothi to PVS Venkatachellum. Born in Rangoon in 1917, she was married in the 1930s to a scion of the P Venkatachellum family, which had made its fortune in condiments and pickles in India and abroad. The bride belonged to a caste that was higher than the groom, a step that was then considered path breaking. While the husband focused on his business, Jothi took to social welfare, which brought her into Congress circles. In 1962, she successfully contested the Madras Legislative Assembly elections as a candidate from Egmore, where the Venkatachellum family had huge landholdings as well as their palatial residence, on Atkinsons Road. That year she became Minister for Public Health in the Kamaraj cabinet. Between 1977 and 1982, she was Governor of Kerala. On her death, Atkinsons Road was named after her. Venkatachellum was tragically killed in a road accident several years earlier.
The other marriage involved a woman who is remembered today for her pioneering social work. Soundaram was one of the eight children of TV Sundaram Iyengar, the founder of the TVS Group. Born in 1904, she was married early to her cousin who was a qualified doctor. Unfortunately he died young while treating plague victims. Respecting his last wishes, Soundaram moved to Delhi and joined the Lady Hardinge Medical College. She obtained her MBBS in 1936. The freedom struggle attracted her and she became a member of Mahatma Gandhi’s inner circle. There she met G Ramachandran who was active in Harijan uplift. The two decided to marry. TV Sundaram Iyengar was none too happy but abided by Gandhi’s advice that if the couple stayed apart for two years and at the end of it still felt the same towards each other, they should be allowed to marry. When at the end of the stipulated period Soundaram and Ramachandran felt the same, Sundaram Iyengar graciously gave in. It was a marriage that spanned the highest and the lowest ends of the caste hierarchy.
It was Gandhi who channelled Soundaram’s energies into women’s welfare, getting her to be the Madras representative on the Kasturba Trust. In 1947, Soundaram began Gandhigram for women, orphans, the disabled and the destitute. In 1957, the Gandhigram Rural Institute was founded, which thanks to the efforts of Ramachandran became a deemed university in 1976. An MLA in 1952 and 1957, Soundaram became an MP in 1962. She was appointed Union Deputy Minister for Education and in that capacity she made primary education compulsory and free all over India. The National Service Scheme was also her brainchild.
Given such shining role models, why do we have such rigid attitudes now?
This article appeared in The Hindu dated 7th July 2013
Grt, Sriram. Ms Jyothi Venkatachalam’s relative is the current President of the Madras Gymkhana
Club and she had an early 60s Impala car, fin-type, red with an emblem-plate on the right-hand side door of the car (the car was a left-hand drive and had only two doors and was a convertible, initially a Rajashtan number plate), used in Ramani Ch’paa’s kalyana Janavasam and in the fil Kathalika Neramillai.
Shankar – That car is still there in Vencatasubramaniam’s house.
Gandhi’s own son Devdas(technically,baniya) married Lakshmi d/o Rajaji(a brahmin),so it was sanctioned by the high & mighty of the freedom movement,this is also one of a fundamental freedom,right to marry a person of your choice sanctioned by the due process of law.
Sriram,
True, times change and bring with it changes. Yet, such rigid attitudes we see today are there because some people don’t change that easily, whichever era they live in!
Thank you for capturing in a nutshell all the efforts and achievements of the two women.
Good to see Jothi Venkatachalam’s picture, which brought back her smile to me.
Dr. Soundaram’s contribution to women’s welfare, education and public health cannot be contained in a book, let alone an essay.
A veritable lioness (a lion’s share, we say!), she worked like a mad woman, touring villages (which had no paved roads to reach them) in a jeep (a serious accident wouldn’t deter her), in her legislative assembly days. She continued this tireless work of connecting with the villagers even when she was occupied in bringing medical facilities, women’s and children’s welfare and
education to Gandhigram and to its surrounding areas.
She worked ceaselessly for years, it made Pandit Nehru exclaim: Soundaram, you have been working so hard, you need semi-retirement! Come to Delhi and take it a bit easy and help
with the education sector too…
Her hard work continued there. As if she missed her health care work, she took upon responsibilities in the health ministry too (her friend and fellow student at medical school–Dr. Sushila Nayyar was the union health minister then).
In a lighter vein, still no triviality, is something about automobiles which has been mentioned in the comments here. She sent to Delhi the slightly new Chevy (Impala?) her father had given her and a driver too, so that she didn’t have to use the official cars for any of her own private use there!
Those were the days when such inspiring men and women lived and breathed for the betterment of our human race…
She was an epitome of Bharathi’s: nimirnda nannaDaiyum, nEr koNDa pArvaiyum, Arkkum anjA neRigaLum…:)
Arasi
Thanks for those wonderful insights!
Ah, as for heritage going hand in hand with music, wonder if Jothi Venkatachalam was trained in music.She would have, is my guess. Dr. Soundaram did not possess a sweet voice, the lioness, but it had majesty. When she played the vINA, it was all kuzhaivu (she was HMB’s student)…
My God! I did not know that Soundaram had learnt from HMB! Are you by any chance mixing her with MS Soundaram, also HMB student and mother of Shyamala Balakrishnan?
Not at all! I knew dear Shyamala’s mother too, the other Soundaram. Have also heard her sing when I was a child. She was nAmakkal Sesha Iyengar’s maithuni.
Dr. Soundaram’s AthAn (and first husband) Dr. Sundarajan’s ancestral house in vIravanallUr was offered to HMB to live in for some time (don’t know exactly when), because he was her guru. I think I’ve mentioned this before in your blog some years ago…