SC leaders in Tamil Nadu have for long accused EVR of saying, contemptuously, in a meeting that the cloth prices had gone up because the ‘Pariah’ caste women started wearing jackets. In 1963, many Ambedkarite magazines in Tamil Nadu had reported this speech. Anbu Ponnoviam, a venerated historian who had meticulously documented the lives of SC leaders and spiritual personalities, had written that as a keen observer of EVR from 1939, he was one of those who were shocked when he heard EVR offering Pariah women wearing jackets and Pariah men becoming literate as reasons for the rise in cloth prices and unemployment (Nasthikam, 2 March 1963).



A Chennai-based magazine, Ambedkar, in its 1963 November-December issue, pointed out that despite SC leaders strongly condemning EVR’s statement. The proof for the statement came from Dravidianists themselves when the Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (DMK) magazine Murasoli published a cartoon highlighting the anti-SC mindset of EVR.

8. EVR sought the help of the British and Jinnah for his Dravidstan. But both treated him as a useful idiot.

It is a well-known fact that EVR and his movement were pro-British and they also supported the Muslim League in its pro-Pakistan demand. In an interview to a Tamil magazine, Anantha Vikatan, in 1965, EVR expressed how he had hoped that, given the pro-British stand of their movement, the British would hand over the authority to the Justice party. In his own words, “I went and told the British that it was not British honesty to hand over the power to them while we are the ones who have always supported you. The British smiled and said that they now knew only Hindu-Muslim difference and not Brahmin non-Brahmin difference. Then I went and saw Jinnah and asked for his help. He said that your bed (plan) looks good but it lacks the legs to stand on. And he told that only I had to look after my problem. The media wrote that Jinnah had tar-brushed the face of EVR.”

9. Kamarajar, the tallest nationalist non-Brahmin leader from Tamil Nadu, never accepted the racist and anti-Hindu views of EVR.

EVR apologists again indulge in propaganda and many have come to even believe that Kamarajar had respect for EVR and his worldview. In reality, Kamarajar consistently opposed EVR’s worldview. When EVR and his cohorts opposed the conference on Silappadikaram, Kamarajar, who attended and supported the conference, criticised the stand of EVR and his Dravidian movement.