C.Natesa Mudaliar

• C. Natesa Mudaliar, also known as Natesan, was a politician and activist of the Dravidian Movement from the Indian state of Tamil Nadu.

• He was one of the founders of the Justice Party along with Theagaroya Chetty and Dr. T. M. Nair.
• He was regarded as the "heart" of the Justice Party.

Early Life

• Natesa Mudaliar was born in a Tamil family of Triplicane, Madras in 1875.
• He had his early schooling in Madras and graduated from Presidency College, Chennai and Madras Medical College before practising as a doctor.

Reuniting

• At the time in 1912, there were two groups in the Madras Corporation Council.
• The Non-Brahmin group was led by the legendary Sir Pitti Theagaroya Chetti.
• The other group was led by T.M. Nair.
• The two leaders often clashed at Council meetings even though both were non-Brahmins.
• Natesa Mudaliar realised that if these two leaders could be brought together it would give the Non-Brahmin movement a fast forward push.
• Thus, Natesa Mudaliar was able to reconcile their differences.

Dravidian Movement

• The Madras Non-Brahmin Association was formed in 1909 by two lawyers from Madras city, P. Subramanyam and M. Purushotham Naidu.
• Theagaraya Chetty did not involve himself in the movement until 1912, when the Madras United League was formed.
• It was formed by disaffected non-Brahmin members of the bureaucracy like Saravana Pillai, G. Veerasamy Naidu, Doraiswami Naidu and S. Narayanaswamy Naidu with C. Natesa Mudaliar as its Secretary.
• Later in 1912 itself (October), Madras United league was renamed as Madras Dravidian Association.
• It was the first time the word Dravidian was used for a political entity.
• Panaganti Ramarayaningar, later the Raja of Panagal was elected its President.
• As a part of its programme, the Madras Dravidian Association conducted a hostel called "Dravidian Home"
• It was for the benefit of non-Brahmin students who did not have hostel privileges due to caste-based discrimination.
• In 1914, Natesan ran such a Dravidian hostel in Triplicane, Madras.
• There was a meeting held in Madras in November 1916 by a group of about thirty people, including Theagaraya Chetti and Dr. T. M. Nair.
• They established the South Indian People's Association (SIPA) to publish English, Tamil and Telugu newspapers to publicise grievances of non-Brahmins.
• Theagarya Chetty became the secretary of SIPA.
• The newspaper was named Justice and started publishing from 26 February 1917 onwards.

• Dr. T. M. Nair was its first Editor.
• The meeting also formed the "South Indian Liberal Federation" (SILF) as a political association.
• Later, the association came to be popularly called the "Justice Party" due to the publication of the Justice Magazine.

• Theagarya served as the first President of the federation from 1917 till his death in 1925.
• The Justice Party sought a remedy by the earliest adoption of reservation and secularisation by law.
• Along with the Justice Party, EVR Periyar's Self Respect Movement, started in 1925, joined hands to form the Dravida Kazhagam (DK) which served the anti-Brahmin, anti-North Indian and anti-Congress outfits.

Political Life

• Natesa Mudaliar sent lengthy telegrams on the Anti Brahmin Movement to the London newspapers at great cost.
• The Times London published that in the 'Letters to the Editor' verbatim, creating quite a stir in Britain and India.
• In 1920, the Doctor moved a resolution in the Madras Corporation Council that what were called the Depressed Classes and usually called Panchamas should be called Adi Dravidas.
• Natesa Mudaliar, along with Theagaroya Chetty, was instrumental in negotiating an end to the Buckingham and Carnatic Mills strike of 1921, organized by V. Kalyanasundaram, populary known as Thiru Vi.Ka.
• India's first labour union, the Madras Labour Union (MLU) was formed at Buckingham and Carnatic Mills by B. P. Wadia and V. Kalyanasundaram Mudaliar on 27 April 1918.
• Natesan did not participate in the first general elections in Madras Presidency held in 1920.
• However, in the 1923 assembly elections, Natesan was elected to the Madras Legislative Council.
• He was twice elected to the Madras Legislative Assembly during 1923-26 and 1933-37.
• At the Non-Brahmin confederation in Coimbatore in 1927, he led the split of the Justice Party into two camps: Ministerialists and Constitutionalists.
• He functioned as the leader of the Constitutionalists till the two groups merged.
• In 1929, Natesan presided over the Justice Party conference in which a resolution was passed facilitating the admission of Brahmins in the party.

Last stage

• Natesan was expected to contest in the 1937 elections to the legislative assembly of Madras.
• But he died all of a sudden in February 1937 at the age of 62.

Legacy

• Natesa Mudaliar lived for his ideals and social reforms and in his honour a road in Triplicane was named after him.
• A park in Thyagaroya Nagar is also named after Natesa Mudaliar.

• K.M. Balasubramaniam, a writer and supporter of the Dravidian Movement, compared him to Mahatma Gandhi.
• His oft repeated phrase was: "The Justice Party is the justest Party, Give that party your support hearty."

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