Chennai: Over time, mates and political friends have proclaimed that Tholkappiyan Thirumavalavan, chairman of the Viduthalai Chiruthaigal Katchi (VCK), or the Liberation Panthers Occasion, is “married to society.”
“He would typically say — I’ve married this society, I’ve married the people who find themselves discriminated towards. To convey them up and empower them is my life,” stated Tamil Nadu Congress chief S. Peter Alphonse stated at an occasion final 12 months. “We’d like leaders like Thiruma,” he added.
For over three many years now, Thirumavalavan, an activist and scholar with a PhD, has been rallying towards the ideology espoused by the Manusmriti (Legal guidelines of Manu). Earlier this month, he was seen distributing booklets with Tamil translations of the verses in Chennai’s busy Koyambedu bus terminus.
Whereas Dr. Ambedkar burnt the Manusmriti, the VCK needs individuals to concentrate on its messages by studying it. The 32-page booklet printed by the VCK has a foreword highlighting why the Manusmriti which they’ve famous to be each misogynistic and casteist is required studying. Occasion cadres are at the moment distributing copies throughout the state.
Talking to ThePrint, Thirumavalavan stated he felt a “ethical concern” when he noticed the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) “asserting itself overtly” in Tamil Nadu and demanding to take out processions in 50 areas final month.
“I felt I wanted to show them, to convey out the reality concerning the RSS. OBC (Different Backward Class) children, particularly, ought to perceive the actual image since there’s a craze now to rejoice Hindu festivals like they do within the North or shout slogans like Jai Shri Ram and Bharat Mata Ki Jai,” he stated.
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Political climb
Recognized right now for his fiery speeches and with a powerful Dalit help base in districts of southern Tamil Nadu, Thol. Thirumavalavan entered politics within the late Nineteen Eighties. He took over the reins of the then Dalit Panthers Iyyakkam (DPI) in 1989 and renamed it VCK the next 12 months.
The DPI was based in 1982 by disaffected Dalits underneath the management of M. Malalchami in Madurai.
For almost a decade, the VCK boycotted electoral politics as “unrepresentative” and “corrupt”, however in 1999 it teamed as much as struggle polls with Ok. Moopanar who had walked out of the Congress to drift his personal get together — the Tamil Maanila Congress (TMC). Although the TMC fared poorly, the VCK fared fairly properly by way of votes polled.
Schedule Castes represent 23.7 per cent of the inhabitants within the state and this Dalit-led Tamil get together has emerged as an vital political participant ever since its first polls.
Within the twenty years because the get together entered electoral politics, it has allied with each Dravidian events — the Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (DMK) and All India Anna Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (AIADMK) — teamed up with the Pattali Makkal Katchi (PMK), and even not directly joined forces with the Bharatiya Janata Occasion (BJP) in a single election.
Throughout this time, the variety of seats it contested has diversified from six to 25 seats. Its vote-share within the Tamil Nadu legislative meeting elections has, at numerous factors, stood at 1.3 p.c (2006), 1.5 p.c (2011), 0.8 p.c (2016), and 1 p.c (2021).
Within the 2019 Lok Sabha elections wherein the DMK-led Social Progressive Alliance gained in a landslide, the VCK was allotted two seats, each of which it gained. The get together’s common secretary, author D. Ravikumar contested on the DMK’s get together image and gained by a distinction of greater than a lakh towards the PMK’s candidate. Thirumavalavan contested on an unbiased image and managed a victory by 3,000 votes towards the AIADMK’s candidate.
The get together now has 4 MLAs within the state legislature, the place VCK is in alliance with the DMK, and two MPs in Lok Sabha, each from Tamil Nadu.
The VCK has began to redefine the political panorama of Tamil Nadu, based on Karthikeyan Damodaran, analysis fellow, Centre for Trendy Indian Research in Germany’s Georg-August-Universität Göttingen.
“No political get together can ignore the Dalits as they used to do prior to now. With their genesis in avenue politics and radical political protests, the VCK has come an extended option to make democratic establishments work in direction of guaranteeing Dalit rights,” he advised ThePrint.
He added that electoral politics in Tamil Nadu is dominated by the “Dravidian duopoly” (AIADMK and DMK) and inside this context for smaller events to emerge as a political drive shouldn’t be a straightforward job.
Damodaran stated that for the VCK, vote sharing and mutual switch of votes with its allies has at all times been a tough problem.
“Thirumavalavan had earlier maintained that there isn’t a mutual switch of votes even whereas working intently with alliance companions as caste pursuits supersede political pursuits,” he stated.
He defined that not solely DMK however for get together that leads the alliance with VCK as a significant ally goes to learn from the presence of Thirumavalavan in garnering the Dalit help.
“Regardless of Dravidian political dominance, the electoral panorama has at all times been an area of how successfully one can cobble collectively a powerful alliance… it’s the place smaller events like VCK and PMK gained a foothold,” he defined.
Over time, the VCK has been on the forefront of many protests which have affected the bigger Tamil inhabitants such because the Cauvery river water problem, Mullaperiyar dam, OBC reservations, and NEET.
This week, the VCK indicated that it’s going to file a healing petition towards the Supreme Court docket’s verdict upholding EWS reservation. “The Modi authorities which has not stuffed 1000’s of backlog vacancies for OBCs, SC and ST communities has been displaying a particular curiosity within the 10 per cent reservation for EWS,” Thirumavalavan stated in a press release.
“Whereas the BJP says all Hindus are one, it’s persistently working towards the pursuits of OBCs, SCs and STs, and in favour of the privileged castes,” he added.
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Aiming for India-wide attain
When requested how the VCK could or is probably not completely different than Dalit events within the North, Thirumavalavan stated that the Dalit pushback to the RSS-BJP is diluted in that a part of the nation and there’s a vacuum in understanding.
“However intellectuals inside the Dalit communities in northern India perceive Sanatana politics,” he added.
“The anti-Manusmriti actions of the VCK motivates them [the intellectuals],” he stated, including that the VCK is attending and responding to extra points exterior Tamil Nadu.
“The VCK goes north and likewise visiting Telangana, Andhra Pradesh, Maharashtra, Karnataka, particularly relating to Dalit atrocities,” he stated. “At any time when I go to Delhi, the interactions are increased. Folks from many states come to debate points,” he stated.
The get together has office-bearers in Kerala, Karnataka, Andhra Pradesh, and Telangana. That is aside from the affect it holds over Tamils in Mumbai and a number of other different components of Maharashtra.
In October, Thirumavalavan was current on the event when the Telangana Rashtra Samithi (TRS), which is in energy in Telangana, handed a unanimous decision to alter the identify of the get together to Bharat Rashtra Samithi.
He was additionally current the next day when Telangana Chief Minister Ok. Chandrashekar Rao introduced his plans to convene a Dalit conclave in Hyderabad.
Talking to the Indian Specific concerning the occasion, VCK chief Ravikumar had stated that the get together needed to “honour” the Telangana authorities’s initiatives since they “spend roughly 13 per cent of their funds on Dalit welfare, which is 5 instances greater than the nationwide common”. He additionally talked about “game-changing” programmes like Dalit Bandhu, which “grants 10 per cent of presidency contracts to Dalits and gives Rs 10 lakh to Dalit companies”.
A month earlier, in September, Thirumavalavan shared the stage with Congress chief Rahul Gandhi on the inauguration of the Bharat Jodo Yatra in Kanyakumari.
Damodaran famous that the VCK regardless of its presentation in media and political circles as a Dalit get together has positively began to draw a a lot wider and multi-caste cadre base.
“VCK is the most important Dalit political get together within the state, however the get together and its chief don’t want to be restricted as such,” Damodaran advised ThePrint.
“Predominant amongst its base is the Muslim help and its rising reputation among the many sections of numerically much less dominant OBCs and MBCs (Most Backward Class),” he stated.
Within the 2021 Tamil Nadu Legislative Meeting Elections, the VCK had fielded six candidates out of which 4 gained, together with a Vanniyar (MBC), and a Muslim candidate.
“Nevertheless, the get together’s giant help base comes from among the many Paraiyar part of the Dalit neighborhood,” stated Damodaran.
‘Social media has damaged limitations’
Within the 23 years he has contested elections, Thirumavalavan stated that the most important change he has seen has come within the type of social media.
“Many social points together with untouchability, atrocities towards Dalits, tribals, ladies, have all gone unaccounted for, by no means mentioned within the media,” he advised ThePrint. “However after social media has developed, these limitations have damaged and it brings these atrocities to mild. It comes underneath debate and political events are held accountable,” he added.
The adjustments, he feels, additionally has vital penalties on the Dalit neighborhood equivalent to vital posts being given to them out of “compulsion” by political events.
“Nevertheless, simply as a lot as there’s a democratic facet to social media, it has additionally allowed the unfold of fascism. There’s a area to develop Hindu nationalism and appeal to children via casteism which ends up in communalism. It has turn into very easy for the RSS to separate the Hindu individuals within the identify of caste,” he added.
(Edited by Theres Sudeep)
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