TOWARDS A NON-BRAHMIN MILLENIUM FROM IYOTHEE TO PERIYAR By V. Geetha and S.V. Rajadurai, Samya, Rs 300 Studies on the development of the non-Brahmin movement in Tamil Nadu have come a long way since the early researches of David Washbrook, Christopher Baker and Eugene Irschik. Early Anglo-American scholarship sought to explain the emergence of non-Brahminism in terms of factional rivalries and situate the movement in a historical context shaped by structural changes in the economy and the transformation in the administrative complex of the colonial state. More recently, the focus has perceptibly shifted to the exploration of an emerging non-Brahmin cum Tamil consciousness that made possible a decisive break in Tamil political traditions and social practice and posited a radical ideology that contested mainstream nationalism. It is in the context of the new historiography that the book under review assumes a special significance and makes a valuable contribution to the understanding of the Dravidian movement that ran its complex course until independence and even thereafter. Using a vast and rich array of Tamil sources, the monograph seeks to delineate the discrete strands of the non-Brahmin movement, the intellectual antecedents of the same, the changing self-perceptions of non-Brahmin ideologues who sought to reclaim their histories and interrogate existing narratives of Brahmin-non-Brahmin polarities. In other words the agenda was for the non-Brahmins to speak for themselves and have their voices heard. Admittedly, the category non-Brahmins is a porous one, inclusive of a number of castes, high and low. But equally, the term has a substantive political dimension that over time symbolized commitment to a certain kind of politics valuing social equality, mutuality and self-respect. It is in exploring the making of the new ideology and the coalescence of the new consciousness that the book under review makes a powerful statement. The latter decades of the 19th century saw non-Brahmins coming together as a sort of corporate group staking its claim to political representation. The spread of vernacular education among the non-Brahmins and the increase in literacy levels sharpened their awareness as a distinct group that had been barred from participation in modern institutions. At the same time, early Congress activity and in particular the tactics of Annie Besant combined, even if inadvertently, to reinforce the political aspirations of the non-Brahmins and to develop Tamil as an effective language of protest and propaganda. The choice of Tamil as the language of protest and politics was important, for it signified a conscious attempt on the part of the non-Brahmins to posit an identity that was in opposition to the Brahmins whose ritual, social and political hegemony was expressed through their access to Sanskrit and English, both markers of privilege and exclusion. At this stage, early non-Brahmin ideologues and publicists were drawn from high caste landed groups like Vellalas, Mudalis and Pillais who with their Nair counterparts in Madras city made a bid for political power and organized the Justice Party and even fought and won the elections to the Madras legislative council in the Twenties. Technically, the Justice Party stood for all non-Brahmin Tamils, ranging from the affluent Vellala to the humble Puliah or untouchable, but in fact differences between the two groups repeatedly surfaced resulting in the increasing isolation of the Justice Party and in the radicalization of the non-Brahmin ideology developed by leaders like M.C. Raju and Periyar. The internal tensions and contradictions within the non-Brahmin movement, particularly in its early stages, needs to be kept in mind, a point that the authors do not address sufficiently in their analysis. The politicization of the non-Brahmins and the emergence of a distinct caste based agenda were sustained by an empowering ideological discourse. The articulation of non-Brahmin politics and its subsequent radicalization was preceded and accompanied by a new reading of the Tamil past, a reading that was largely inspired by early Orientalist enterprise. The Orientalist ordering of Tamil society as unique in terms of its linguistic expression and historical development prior to the advent of Brahminical and Sanskrit influences of the North held a powerful appeal for an entire generation of non-Brahmin publicists who were caught up in retrieving an appropriate heritage for validating their identity and status in society. The writing of the history of Tamil Nadu became a major and self-conscious project, even if it remained quite isolated from professional history writing encouraged by Madras University and one that remained the preserve of Brahmin Sanskrit scholars. Scholars like P. Sundaram Pillai, V. Kanakasabhai, J.M. Nallaswami Pillai and Maramati Adigal took up the onus of developing a Dravidian ideology and posited a new paradigm of civilizational progress. The new history glorified the Vellala, the original inhabitant of the Tamil country who symbolized superior moral values in his person and pursuit. The Vellala agriculturalist with his adherence to Saiva Saidhhant religion stood at the forefront of Tamil society. In this new scheme, it was the Brahmin who was uncivilized, performed sacrifices and worshipped a number of minor deities and created myths and symbols to perpetuate his assumed superiority. The new history sought to redress this imbalance, to disenfranchize the Brahmins and replace them with the Vellala elite; but it denied political agency to non-Vellala castes, an omission that was so evidently reflected in the fallout of Justice Party politics in the late Twenties. The emergence of new and alternative narratives to contest the early Vellala discourse reflected the vitality of the developing Dravidian movement that exercised a powerful impact on the newly mobilized groups in Tamil society. Even before Self Respect and Periyar made their cutting edge, writers like Masilamani, Iyothee Thass and Periysami Pulaiyar confronted the problems of the untouchables and sought to reclaim a history that has been deliberately subverted by the Brahmin. The arrival of self-respect and the emergence of Periyar as the undisputed leader of the Self Respect Movement enlarged the contours of the Dravidian discourse, the emphasis shifting from pride in the Tamil language and in the legacy of a unique Tamil past to the valourization of the Vellala to a strident critique of religion and caste/gender discrimination. This critique established Hinduism as constituting multiple relations of power, an argument that enabled the movement to address a wider range of issues by recognizing a number of inferiorized identities. Thus the Self Respect movement opened up a wider terrain of conflict and made an effective foray into mass politics, the results of which remain part of today?s contemporary reality in Tamil Nadu.