Thread by @realitycheckind

I committed to blog about the famous #Dravidian "Kasi" saga of Mr E.V.Ramasamy (Periyar) but it may take time I have too much on my plate. So let me just put the evidence up here in interest of public. (In English because of interest expressed) 1/

Essentially the story goes Periyar left his house in ~1905 in a huff and spent a couple of years (or lesser) as a wandering hindu sadhu mendicant in AP (Bezawada / Hyd) -- he was accompanied by two Tamizh brahmins Venkatrama Iyer and Ganapati Iyer

The three would go around and give religious discourses -- the two tamizhbrahmin would speak in tamil and Periyar would humorously translate it to Telugu in his own irreverent style. This story is installed deep into every tamilian as a #D foundation issue. see this movie scene

This narrative is consistent -- it finds place in official biographies viz. Sami Sidambaranar's book as well as Karunanandam's bio (see pic).

Hilited says Periyar translated the discourses to Telugu and regaled his audience

But I was reading DK's newspaper Viduthalai.. I caught a clinching evidence. Periyar himself says he forgot his mother tongue and native telugu or kannada cant even understand him.

Kudiarasu 14/8/1948

cc @atisha ஏதாவது விளக்கம் இருக்கா தோழர்?

Another red flag the incident does not figure in Periyar's own autobio "Than Varalaaru" written around 1920. He mentions all kinds of comparatively trivial incidents. But that is a separate issue. Here he pulls the plug on the lie.

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