A committee formed by the followers and admirers of T.Chennaiah, Gandhian, freedom fighter from Kolar, one of the heroes of the Vidurashwattha struggle and a member of the Constituent Assembly, is gearing up to belatedly organise the birth centenary of the late leader on November 16.
Although the centennial was in 2012, the committee decided to commemorate a visionary leader in the absence of any government initiative.
Born in a poor Dalit family on October 12, 1912, Mr. Chennaiah worked hard and rose to become a member of Constituent Assembly of independent India, minister in the Kengal Hanumanthaiah Government in the then Mysore and a member of the Rajya Sabha.
He participated in the Freedom struggle and was jailed several times for his role in it. He was one of the participants of the Vidurashwattha protest, which is also known as the Jalianwallabagh of the South, in which nine people including a pregnant woman were killed in firing by British police.
He also participated in the Karnataka unification and Goa liberation struggles.
Closely associated with Mahatma Gandhi and B.R. Ambedkar, he is credited with Gandhiji’s visit to Kolar’s Kelaginapet - now called Gandhinagar. Known for his simplicity, Mr. Chennaiah is remembered for the fact that he did not own a car and lived in a modest, tiled-roof house till his death on January 18, 1985.
He studied up to fourth standard in Kolar and had to break his education due to his family’s acute poverty. He later continued education and passed out of Maharaja College, Mysore. He became the first SC or ST student to get a B.Sc degree, says Kotiganahalli Ramaiah, one of the functionaries who initiated the T. Chennaiah Centenary Celebration Committee.
Had his visionary plan to supply water from the Markandeya tank and Cauvery to undivided Kolar been implemented, people in the region would have had to agitate for drinking water, his son, Balaji Chennaiah, told The Hindu.
As minister, Mr. Chennaiah got hostels built for underprivileged students in several parts of Karnataka. Nachiketa Nilaya in Kolar and Siddhartha Nilaya in Mysore are prominent among them.
He left his mark as an upright minister when he successively handled the portfolios of Health, Municipal Administration, Excise, Forest, Planning, Agriculture and Prisons; and in his contribution to development works in Kolar and Chikballapur.
.
