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"They wouldn't stop beating us" The boy told reporters he had been working in the fields when he grew thirsty and approached a public hand-pump near the home of Sanjay Rajput.
u/Ok-Increase-8359 — 4 days ago
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Changing tide of Dalit politics in Tamil Nadu
A new party has been rising in the political scenes of Tamil Nadu which was up until now dominated by bipolar hegemony of the Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (DMK) and the All India Anna Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (AIADMK), and yes i am not talking about TVK, but Viduthalai Chiruthaigal Katchi ( Liberation Panther Party) (விடுதலைச் சிறுத்தைகள் கட்சி), formerly known as the Dalit Panthers of India or the Dalit Panthers Iyyakkam.
In the latest assembly elections of 2026, despite having just two MLAs in Tamil Nadu, the Viduthalai Chiruthaigal Katchi has emerged as a crucial player in government formation, with attention firmly on whether it will back Vijay's TVK in crossing the majority mark. The VCK sought four seats from the DMK, but was allotted only two reserved seats - both of which it won. But since TVK was just 10 short of majority mark, it gave a rare opportunity to VCK to extend its influence beyond its capabilities. Likely Thirumavalavan wont let this moment slip away.
>In the 25 years since its foray into electoral politics, Thirumavalavan’s party – the Viduthalai Chiruthaigal Katchi (VCK) – has evolved into a strategic and astute force and the biggest Dalit party in Tamil Nadu. Though its electoral strength has remained limited in terms of seats, VCK has by now emerged as a crucial alliance player. Following the 2026 Assembly elections, the party has now become a kingmaker in Tamil Nadu politics after extending support to Vijay’s Tamilaga Vettri Kazhagam (TVK) in the formation of the new government.
Getting into some history, it actually emerged as a radical anti-caste movement in the early ‘80s in Madurai, where a thin young Dalit man held hundreds of people captive with a rousing speech. He was speaking about a Dalit youth named Manikkapatti Kaatturaja who was murdered for consuming water from a facility used by dominant caste people. A few months later, he was heading yet another fiery protest as part of a Tamil Nadu-wide agitation against the then MGR government for mandating 90% compulsory attendance for Dalit and Adivasi students for the grant of scholarships. The order was publicly burnt by the protesting students and youngsters. Within months, the government rescinded its order. The youngster became a well-known face of peaceful protests, rallies, and public meetings in Tamil Nadu in the 1980s. Within a short span of five to six years, he grew to be one of the most influential Dalit leaders the state had witnessed in the 20th century. He was A Malaichamy, a lawyer by profession, whose 34th death anniversary falls on Thursday, September 14.
The founders drew direct inspiration from the Dalit Panthers of Maharashtra—founded in 1972 by JV Pawar, Namdeo Dhasal, and Raja Dhale—which was itself modeled after the revolutionary Black Panther Party in the United States.
Initially, the DPI functioned as a loosely organized network of grassroots activists dedicated to protecting Dalit communities from caste-based violence in the southern districts of Tamil Nadu. Malaichamy, a lawyer who had been active in the Dravidar Kazhagam (DK) youth wing, brought legal advocacy and structural reform to the movement. He led campaigns to rename segregated Dalit settlements (conventionally denigrated as cheris) and was among the first to demand internal reservations for the highly marginalized Arundhathiyar community, seeking to unite the three major Dalit sub-castes: the Devendrakula Velalars, the Paraiyars, and the Arundhathiyars. Malaichamy argued that the state government was undermining Dalit empowerment by offering welfare subsidies instead of enforcing constitutional rights and physical security.
>In the 20th century, Maharashtra’s Bombay witnessed several first generation Dalit youths completing their post graduation. Some of them began embracing literature as a way to express their frustrations of being discriminated against for centuries. In the 1960s, the works of several poets, authors, and artists – under the name ‘Little Magazine Movement’ – spoke vociferously against the government’s approach towards the caste system and the then state of Dalit politics.
>On September 9, 1972, some Dalit writers from the Little Magazine Movement decided to move from literature to active political participation and founded the Dalit Panthers of India (DPI), at a public meeting in Bombay, influenced by the revolutionary African-American Black Panther Party. DPI was founded by JV Pawar, Namdeo Dhasal, and Raja Dhale, and other prominent leaders such as Ramdas Athawale (now Union Minister of Social Justice), Professor Arun Kamble, SM Pradhan, Pritamkumar Shegaonkar too joined the movement. However, within three years of its inception, the DPI split over ideological differences, a few leaders standing with Dhasal and others with Dhale. Athawale was one among those who stood with Dhale.
>In 1977, after Dhale dismissed the DPI committee without holding any meeting with other members, Athawale and a few other leaders started the Bharatiya Dalit Panthers (BDP). Arun Kamble was selected as its leader, Gangadhar Gade as general secretary, and Athawale remained as the organiser. Later, Dr BR Ambedkar’s wife Savita Ambedkar joined the BDP, which became active in 17 states, including Tamil Nadu.
>It was during the expansion of BDP to other Indian states that the leaders were looking for a suitable candidate to head the Tamil Nadu wing of the party. In 1982, some of Malaichamy’s friends who had travelled to Bombay for work got in touch with him and introduced him to Athawale.
>Parallelly, Dr K Krishnasamy [who later started the Puthiya Tamilagam (PT) party], who was running a clinic in Tiruppur district’s Poolavadi, was contemplating a separate Dalit front to fight for their rights. He proposed the idea to his friend Sengottaiyan, who was a student leader in his college. He also introduced Sengottaiyan to Malaichamy. Recalling this incident, Sengottaiyan said that the introduction happened at a wedding. “I was told by Krishnasamy that Malaichamy was in contact with Dalit leaders Athawale and Savita Ambedkar. So instead of starting a new front altogether, we decided to join him,” he told TNM.
>In 1982, Malaichamy travelled to Bombay and took part in a public meeting held by the BDP, in which he was named the Tamil Nadu convener of BDP. The Tamil Nadu branch of the BDP was called Dalit Panther Iyakkam (meaning Dalit Panther Movement), and hence went by the DPI acronym, though on paper its name was Bharatiya Dalit Panthers. According to available documents, the inaugural DPI state conference was held in August 1983.
>A rally by Dalit Panther Iyakkam members in the 1980sDalit Panther Document Centre
>On the handbills that were distributed ahead of the meeting, Malaichamy said, “No political party in our land will struggle on our behalf. All political parties in our country are under the control of caste Hindus. We, ourselves, must be ready to struggle to claim our community’s rights. We must ameliorate our present condition in which we are broken and shattered into pieces.”
For almost a decade since its inception, the Liberation Panthers had boycotted electoral politics as unrepresentative and corrupt. Cadre spoiled ballots with messages such as ‘none of you is worthy, so none will have our votes’, and questioned the legitimacy of the democratic process. The move led to them being cast as extremists, hounded by the police and alienated from their supporters
Stalin Rajangam, a Dalit scholar and writer, said that DPI was a major movement that brought under it all major Dalit caste groups. “Its organiser Malaichamy belonged to the Devendra Kula Vellalar community, president D David belonged to the Adi Dravidar (earlier called Paraiyar) community, and secretary Sengottaiyan to the Arundhathiyar community – the three major Dalit groups. Sengottaiyan said that Malaichamy did not want to be identified as a Pallar leader. “There has always been this habit of having a leader for each individual caste group. Malaichamy was careful in that he wanted all Dalits to unite and demand their rights,”
During the late 1980s, when Malaichamy was actively building the DPI movement, a young Government Forensic Officer arrived in Madurai with a letter given to him by a friend. He was asked to meet Malaichamy, who would provide the necessary help for his stay and other needs. The officer was attracted by the politics of Malaichamy and his associates, and joined the movement. A powerful orator, he started addressing meetings where he was able to hold the crowd together. Soon, the youngster – Thol Thirumavalavan – became a close associate of Malaichamy.
Stalin Rajangam said that Thirumavalavan’s oratory skills made him the natural choice to take over as DPI’s leader after Malaichamy’s death. After Thirumavalavan took over the reins of DPI, things started to change. “In 1990, the Madurai-based political movement was transformed into a political party and rechristened Viduthalai Chiruthaigal Katchi (VCK)." The 1990s was a crucial period in Dalit politics. John Pandian’s Tamil Nadu Makkal Munnetra Kazhagam, Dr Krishnasamy’s PT, and Thirumavalavan’s VCK emerged as key parties among the different Dalit groups. “The way in which electoral politics functions in the state does not give space for Dalit parties to function independently. Dravidian parties who kept calling them ‘casteist parties’ couldn’t ignore them for a very long time, given that they were able to mobilise the masses"
Economic clout and political influence among the masses are two indeniable factors when it comes to elections. And this is what leads to Dalit parties joining hands with either of the Dravidian parties, as they do not have the necessary financial resources and are able to make only limited inroads with non-Dalit groups.
“Though the atrocities against Dalits have reduced due to the intervention of these parties, they have also lost whatever they built upon – questions of Dalit mobilisation, representing the Dalit cause, highlighting Dalit issues, fighting for Dalit rights, etc – because of various reasons, including the political machinations in the state. Further, both VCK and PT have aspirations to be part of mainstream politics, so they started moving towards larger issues and identities. PT has moved towards a Hindutva-based identity while VCK wants to assimilate into Dravidian and Tamil identities. This is inevitable when it comes to electoral politics,” Prof Karthikeyan pointed out.
“Why did the Dalit sub-sects turn against each other despite being from the same socioeconomic status? They see each other as enemies, so there is no one to talk against the common enemy. This also helps the current political parties, because if Dalits are consolidated it will impact them. Non-Dalits or dominant political parties led by caste Hindus deliberately encourage such sub-caste division by not adhering to the rule of law. For example, not fulfilling SC reservation, whereby a small difference exaggerated the enmity among them,” said C Lakshmanan, who heads Dalit Intellectual Collective.
Semmalar Selvi, who is a Social Work professor in a college in Chennai, said, “The current environment in the state is not conducive for Dalits to even survive. The DMK keeps talking about social justice, Periyar land, Dravidian politics, etc, but there are concentrated attacks on Dalits. Like the Hindutva hate politics in the north, it is caste-based hate politics in Tamil Nadu against Dalits. The DMK government has been utterly disappointing in terms of protecting the cause of Dalits and I am sure this is going to be the pattern. This is evident from looking into the response of this government on the growing brutal atrocities against Dalits which has rampantly increased after the DMK came to power. I don’t have any belief that this government will take an open stand with Dalits,” she said, adding that the government is not standing with the Dalits for fear of losing the support of OBC caste outfits and their votes.
Discontented supporters have moaned about the VCK becoming the ‘SC/ST wing of the DMK’, and so the allocation of two general constituencies is symbolically powerful.
>If core supporters are not to be further alienated, now is the time for the party to show that it can deliver and shape policy rather than being a junior ally. For a start, the party must reaffirm its commitment to the Dalit cause. The victory in general constituencies should not in any form pave the way for a watered-down approach on such issues. Key steps here could be to strenuously articulate demands for Panchami Land retrieval, proper implementation of the Scheduled Caste Sub Component Plan and legislation against so-called ‘honour killings’.
>The party should also seek to halt the various measures to evict the Dalit slum population from city centres, which has resulted in vertical forms of ghettoization, denial of employment opportunities resulting in the concentration of poverty and crime. The Left parties could become worthy allies in these political demands and struggles.
>During his stint as an MLA, D. Ravikumar, now an MP, lobbied for a series of measures for transgenders and to replace mud huts with concrete dwellings, but little of this was known by the party members let alone others. With the security offered by six parliamentary representatives, the VCK could revamp its magazine Tamil Mann and use its online TV channel to alert people to the steps that they are taking.
https://thewire.in/politics/tamil-nadu-elections-vck-dalit-liberation-panthers-party-thirumavalavan
The 2026 Assembly election marked a new phase in the VCK’s political journey. Though the party’s independent electoral strength remains modest, its post-poll relevance has assumed a greater significance. With Tamil Nadu delivering a fractured mandate, the VCK emerged as a crucial player in government formation.
After days of uncertainty, the party extended support to Vijay’s TVK, helping the alliance cross the majority mark and enabling Vijay to stake claim to form the government. The decision is politically significant not only because it places the VCK at the centre of power negotiations, but also because it is expected to give the party a direct share in governance for the first time.
In the political ecosystem where Dalit politicians and parties are most often relegated to reserved constituencies, this moment represents, for supporters, the culmination of Thirumavalavan’s long-standing demand that Dalit parties should not merely support governments from the outside, but participate in power-sharing itself.
https://www.thenewsminute.com/tamil-nadu/vck-the-dalit-party-that-reshaped-tamil-nadu-politics
paragraphs mostly taken from mentioned sources
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