an old writeup on Palakkad Iyers..

an old writeup on Palakkad Iyers..

Prepared and posted by me a couple of years ago

Our origins are still not properly documented..

The history is gathered by way of oral traditions..

And we are a class who lack very much in sense of history..

And sometimes there is misinformation too..

Malayattoor Ramakrishnan, in his Malayalam Novel "Verukal" takes us through a paradesi (settler) brahmin family tradition, as lived by persons of Ottra (single) madam in the Perumbaavoor area near Kochi..

But in a novel called "Nettoor madam" penned by him, the location of the novel is stated as "Sekharipuram, " in Palakkad, but evidently the description does not match..
Apparently he was not conversant with the nuances of Agraharam life of Palakkad..

There is one novel in Malayalam called "Gramam", which has for its background the agraharams around Kollengode.. Though written by a non-bramin, the descripition of Iyer life in that novel is realistic.

Sarah Thomas, has written a novel Naarmadi pudavai.. having the Kerala Iyer life (based in Trivandrum area ) as the background.

But in all these, the writers are free to take poetic licences.. so the descriptions need not be authentic..

If the leading lights of the PI community compare notes and document their ancestry and roots it will be welcome..

There are Palakkad Brahmins who have re-located to Mumbai and have a history of about 200 years..

There are those who have gone back to Chennai and still retain their PI identity..

There are Delhi PIs and Calcutta PIs.

And now there are Gulf PIs, European PIs, Australian PIs, 

US-Canada PIs..

The history of PIs can be complete only if all such persons co-ordinate and exchange notes in an atmosphere of strict authenticity, not coloured by emotions and biases..

It is a tall order.

Apart from the Agraharams of Palakkad, and Trivandrum. there are many PI settlements with sparse to moderate population in Malabar area, Perinthalmanna, Tirur( Thrikkandiyur), Calicut, Kannur, Quilandy, Taliparambu, Payyanur, Thrissur ( Poonkunnam, Pushpagiri agraharams) Chalakkudy, Ernakulam, Thrippoonithura, Alapuzha, Kottayam ( thirunakkara) Kollam, ....almost everywhere in Kerala..and then individual Ottramadams..

The Iyers of Nagercoil and even Tiruchendur have a close empathy with the Kerala Iyers..

. A census with special emphasis or gothram, sect, kuladeivam, adimaikkavu, ( not with any idea to claim superiority of one sect over other) can be undertaken. 

In the huge population of India, we are really an endangered species and we do not care much to maintain our pedigree, of late.

 So documentation is essential.

.At least for the information of the children, grandchildren and posterity.. If the website which is indicated as being under construction could address at least partially to these issues it would be great.

There is no adequate documentation.. We have only mouth to ear traditions.. A lot of facts can be brought out if we read various minutes of the proceedings of the temple committees, Brahmaswam parishads, Patasalas, Property transaction documents etc. spread over at least five hundred years... We can draw a lot of inspiration from the various festivities and ceremonies conducted in our houses and in various temples..

And we can see that festivals in each temple has its own distinctive features, although we follow Vaikahanas or Siva agamas.. generally..

The first settlement of Iyers is famed to be at Sekharipuram, my own agraharam.. 

However,  every pattar if he is aware that he knows a little more than anyone else will not share that knowledge, but will use it only to flaunt the ignorance of others..

The social evolution is dynamic and if we miss the bus by not proper written or electronic documentation, and without an open mind, the community is doomed to bury its culture..

Ulloor Parameshvara Iyer  is the pioneer who documented the cultural and literary history of Kerala.. but his writings have little to do with Iyer community as such..  Honble Justice V R Krishna Iyer pioneered the Land Reforms in Kerala, and has been a votary of liberal judicial activism and human liberty as such..in his eminent career as a jurist. and politician...
But there is nothing that can be mentioned as his contribution to Iyer community..

If you watch the demographic and social content of the agraharam either in Tamilnadu or Kerala, there is always a group who have attained a sort of elite-hood through affluence, greater knowledge, or physical fitness or gift of the gab... and side by side other groups suffer in comparison and the friction starts.. Often the majority is controlled by the elite by sharing the spoils and other below the belt  machinations..
 The deprived ones are left with no choice but migrate.. because the majority never supports the minority but comes down heavily on them..
The migration of Brahmis from TamilNadau-- Arcots, Trichy, Tanjavur, Madurai, Tirunelveli, all have happened because of this..
And the migrants, were usually not Vedic Scholars ( one or two might have been there), but traders of clothes and other utility items and cooks, etc..
The establishment of temples, Vedic Patasalas etc in Palakkad and other pattar colonies in Kerala has come through the support of the local rulers and Vassals, in the respective locality.. The pattars in Trivandrum thrived under the tutelage of the Travancore Kings..

The pattars in palakkad got support and gifts of land etc from the Raja of Palakkattussery, the Achan, the Raja of Kollengode and others.. One reason was also that the nambudiris were not willing to officiate for the then kings around Palakkad who were not Kshatriyas..

It goes to the credit of the Pattars that even though they had migrated essentially as dissident and deprived groups, they shaped their agraharams exactly after their parent groups in Tamilnadu.. The villages like Vaidyanathapuram and Chockanathapuram in Palakkad are after the deities at Vaitheeswaran Koil and Madurai..

If we go further in deapth, we could locate some proto-type in Tamilnadu for every brahmin settlement in Kerala.. The majority presence of Vadamas in certain Villages, Mankudi, Ashtasahasram, Vadhyama, Chozhiyas etc in some agraharams all can be explained on this basis..

We are talking eighty percent of Tamil and 20 percent of Malayalam..

The iyer dialect is considered to be a part of Malayalam Language by scholars of that language.

And there is hardly a Pattar in Kerala, who does not know Malayalam..

There have been great poets in Malayalam like Ulloor S Parameswara Iyer, and writers like Malayattoor Ramakrishnan who really mattered in Malayalam literature..

I am a pattar and I can read, write, speak advanced Tamil, but I and most of my pattar kin have known only Malayalam as our Mother tongue..

Even Palakkad Iyer migrants from Kerala to Mumbai, have their roots in Malayalam and Kerala... they are not Tamilians..

If we try to trace the pure ethnicity of brahmins, that will not stop with Tamilnadu.. We can trace ourselves back to Indo-Gangetic Plane and Sapta Saindavam, and even Asiaminor or Eurasia and so on..

But I am sure a Brahmin in Kerala, even if he is talking dialect akin to Tamil, he is a Keralite first and Keralite Last..
Kerala is our property and our mother as it is to any other Keralite..

Any discussion on this issue can be made only after accepting that one single immutable rule that we belong to Kerala..

the deprivation in their root abodes, and instinct of survival, and flexible market conditions, positive attitude of the rulers of Kerala, have all contributed to the establishment of pattar or Palakkad Iyer settlements in Kerala.. And pattars saw places in kerala..
The Divan or Dalava of Travancore once was a Rama Iyer.. And Ganapthy Sastrigal who discovered many manuscripts of Sankrit and presented the legendary sankrit Poet Bhasa to the Literary world was such a migrant.. The story does not end there.. Seshan the Minister,Justice Krishna Iyer, Seshan the Election Commissioner, Sundaram the minister  are all legends.. There are innumerable Iyer luminaries in the Civil services.The pattars produces two Chairmen at least in CBDT.. Moorthy Sir, and Narayanan Sir.. If we start listing the great Keralite Iyers, the space would be inadequate..