Malabar History journal

Biography

V T Bhattathirippad was born on 26 March, 1896 in Mezhathur, Ponnani Taluk in Malabar. His parents were Thuppan Bhattathiripad and Sreedevi Antharjanam. He started vedic education at the age of five in the traditional way. He continued and completed his vedic studies under the patronage of Padakkara Manaikkal Meledam and Muthukurussi Namboodiripad. After his studies, he worked as a priest at Mundamuka Shastra Temple of Kudallur Mana, Shornur. During this period, a 10-year-old girl in the neighbourhood wanted to solve a maths problem. Unable to read the text she showed, Bhattathirippad pleaded with her to make him her disciple from whom he studied alphabets and basic mathematics under a tree. He joined the Yogakshema Sabha, an organisation meant for the upliftment of Namboothiris and then the freedom struggle. He could learn the sufferings of his community through the magazines and journals like Kerala Patrika and Yogakshemam. He joined the Edakkuni Namboodiri School and acquired English education. It was during this time that he started a magazine called Vidyarthi. He used his pen to fight against conservative systems. He died on 12 February, 1982. Kerala Sahitya Academy honoured him with a distinguished fellowship in 1976. The Sreekrishnapuram V T Bhattathiripad College in Palakkad is named after him. His famous works include Rajanirangam (short stories), Atukalayil Ninnu Arangathekku (drama), Pomvazhi (shortstories) and Vetivattam (Essays). His Kanneerum Kinavum is a moving autobiography which has won wide admiration and has been translated to English.

As a reformer

V T attended the 1921 Congress meet held at Allahabad inspired by the freedom struggle happening in North India, making him an outcast in his community. This inspired him to start his fight against the caste system. He applied his heart and soul to the movement for social reforms. Nambudiri women were long being suppressed due to the age-old evil social customs. Young girls were married to old widowers while widow remarriage was not permitted. He strongly criticized this and led the way by marrying from another community and giving his widow sister-in-law to M R Bhattathirippad who was himself a reformer and writer. He strongly advocated for the emancipation of women and tried to liberate them from the kitchen and their customary umbrellas and to bring them forward. He set his face against the customs of temples which he considered the citadels of orthodoxy. He went on fighting through his pen contributing articles bearing revolutionary ideas through Unni Namboothiri, a magazine started in 1927. His famous drama ‘Adukkalayil Ninnu Arangathekku’, first staged in 1929 at Edakkunni near Thrissur, played a very powerful role in the social reformation movement led by Namboothiri Yogakshema Sabha. The drama enacts the practices and rituals in the Namboothiri community especially the plights of Antharjanam. Marked a deviation in Malayalam Theatre, it was the first play in Malayalam to have a definite and concrete social objective while until then themes of malayalam drama were history based. In 1931, he conducted Yachana Yatra from Thrissur to Chandragiri River which lasted for seven days as part of fund collection for his Brahmin widow remarriage campaigns.

It was in 1937 that Udbuddha Kerala started under his editorship, which also served to carry his message far and wide. He also brought out his heterodox views through his writing such as short stories, articles and memories. The autobiography of V T, Kanneerum Kinavum well explained the rituals and customs that surrounded Namboothiri family life in the past and aimed at demolishing the basic elements of aristocracy. He advocated for a ‘Satvik’ Renaissance for his community, in which a transformation not only in an aesthetic and material aspects of class, but a spiritual and intellectual movement towards social justice which could only be accomplished through the abolition of caste differences. Opposed to the unequal status framing the elder brother and younger brother within a patrilineal lineage and around Nambudiri women’s marginalization in the community and wider malayali society, he was strongly against the gendered family hierarchies.

References

• “V. T. Bhattathiripad – the renowned Social reformer of Kerala.” Kerala Culture. http://www.keralaculture.org/vt-bhattathiripad/731.
• Gallo, Ester. The Fall of Gods: Memory, Kinship, and Middle Classes in South India. OUP India, 2018.
• “’Adukkalayil Ninnu Arangathekku’ staged.” The New Indian Express, 11 November 2018. http://www.newindianexpress.com/…/adukkalayil-ninnu-arangathekku-staged.
• Shaji, K. A. (29 March 2015). “An inspiring banyan tree.” The Hindu. Retrieved 6 August 2022. https://www.thehindu.com/…/an-inspiring-banyan-tree.
• Datta, Amaresh. (1987). “Bhattathiripad.” In Encyclopaedia of Indian Literature: A–Devo. Sahitya Akademi, p. 479.