Tamil author Perumal Murugan has alleged serious irregularities in book procurement at Coimbatore’s Periyar Arivulagam library, citing questionable publishers, inflated prices and historical inaccuracies. Tamil Nadu’s education minister has announced an investigation. Chief Minister C Joseph Vijay accused the previous DMK government of corruption.
Chennai: A ‘literary corruption’ has rocked Tamil Nadu, with award-winning author Perumal Murugan exposing a suspected scam in the procurement of books for the erstwhile DMK Government’s flagship Periyar Arivulagam (Periyar Knowledge World) library in Coimbatore from publications and authors who were unheard of in literary circles.
Book Contains Fictional Political Figures
As a result, there is a book titled ‘Tamil Nadu Oru Paarvai’ (Tamil Nadu: An Overview), written by Dhanalakshmi Arjun, which describes a certain Muthuvelu Subbaiya Iyer as the first Chief Minister of Tamil Nadu in 1947. The author says he played an essential leadership role and had a major impact in the Legislative Assembly. The truth, though, is M S Iyer is a fictional character, perhaps born out of the fertile imagination of an AI tool deployed by the author. The same book says, “Thereafter, from 1952, M.K. Ramasamy, the political hero of Dravidian East, emerged as a prominent political leader.” But Tamil Nadu has heard of only E V Ramasamy, who is known as Periyar, the social reformer in whose memory the newly inaugurated library in Coimbatore has been named after.
Political Row Over Library Inauguration
The irony is, when Chief Minister C Joseph Vijay recently inaugurated the library, his predecessor in office and DMK president M K Stalin was quick to point out that the project was conceived during his tenure as Chief Minister. Not just that, two days, the Dravidar Kazhagam, which Periyar had founded, organised a massive felicitation function for Stalin in Coimbatore for having initiated the Periyar Arivulagam.
Perumal Murugan Questions Book Procurement
However, author Perumal Murugan was flabbergasted when he went through some of the books stocked in the library. Penning his views in the Tamil portal Sindhai, Murugan wrote: “I have been associated with the literary world for four decades, yet I have never heard of ‘Agal Vilakku Publications’, which claims to have published 1,800 books. Perhaps my reading horizon and thirst for knowledge have been that limited!”
Expensive Book Raises Literary Questions
The book ‘Naladiyar Vazhkaiyin Vazhi Kaatti’ (Naladiyar: A Guide to Life), authored by Surya Balu, is priced at just ₹1,445 for a 300-page volume! But the price is just one aspect. The book hails Naladiyar as an “important poet and philosopher” of Tamil. “I was left completely bewildered after reading this. Despite having formally studied Tamil literature for nearly 15 years and taught it for 30 years, I was unaware that Naladiyar was a poet and philosopher! I have always learnt that Naladiyar is a collection of 400 four-line Venba verses composed by Jain ascetics whose identities are unknown. Was that understanding wrong?” Murugan wondered.
