Thillaiyadi...who?
THILLAIYADI VALLIAMMAI? – I know, the Co-Optex showroom on
***
22nd February 1898
Munuswamy and Janakiammal, a young immigrant couple from a small village called Thillaiyadi in Thanjavur had come here to work their way out of difficulty.
On this day a baby girl was born to them. The happy couple named her Valliammai.
She grew in an environment that was rather hostile to Indians. But the young child did not even know that it was not right to be segregated so…until she was in her early teens.
March 14th 1913
A law was passed that any marriage that is not according to the Church or according to the marriage law of
Indians were hit. Wives lost rights over husbands’ property, husband’s protection. Children were to be nothing more than bastards. Doubts regarding inheritance of wealth of parents arose.
Mohandas Gandhi began his opposition. Young Valliammai joined her mother in the march by women from Transvaal to
While crossing into
She heard somebody tell: Why don’t you people register and become South Africans instead? Indians!
If having a flag is what would give form to
Gandhi met her and asked: Do you not regret having been to jail? Look at you!
If going back to jail again would add to the cause, I would do it again, she replied.
22nd February 1914
Valliammai’s 16th birthday. The one with a heart of steel breathed her last. Too early for her. Too early for us.
***
She gave us our National flag (Gandhi designed the flag with the same three colours as her sari), a greater resolve (in his own words) to Gandhi’s freedom fight, undying fiery guts to women and a soul full of strength for her, our country.
When, on occasion of her 100th birth anniversary in 1998 it was asked of the Indian Govt. by Tamil leaders to release a stamp in her honour, it was not done, God knows why not…At least we shall continue to remember her.
---
Since I was reading up the designing of our National Flag, I read about Pingali Venkaiah, who has been credited as the designer of our National Flag. He suggested red and green as the colours - representing Hindus and Muslims). Gandhi changed the red to saffron and introduced white (representing other minorities) in the middle and each colour represented the people living in India. Later it was re-defined by Dr. Radhakrishnan as saffron - for renunciation and purity (of the rulers!), white for peace and green for prosperity.
(The information available about Valliammai is limited. We are told her sari had the 3 colours and that she tore it and held it aloft as her flag. It may not have been in the pattern of a flag itself, though it might have been tri-coloured and this having been a possibility, though assumptive, is high.)
© riverine., all rights reserved.
In case you missed...
Some other recent posts by riverine
© 1998-2008 Copyright Sulekha.com Connecting Indians Worldwide, All Rights Reserved.
Recommend