Dravida Nadu
Initially, the demand of Dravida Nadu proponents was limited to Tamil-speaking regions, but it was later expanded to include other Indian states with a majority of Dravidian-speakers (Andhra Pradesh, Telangana, Kerala and Karnataka).
[6][7] In 1960, the DMK leaders decided to withdraw their demand for a Dravida Nadu from the party programme at a meeting held in the absence of Annadurai.
Ramasamy was an atheist, and considered the Indian nationalism as "an atavistic desire to endow the Hindu past on a more durable and contemporary basis".
[12] The proponents of Dravida Nadu fabricated elaborate historical anthropologies to support their theory that the Dravidian-speaking areas once had a great non-Brahmin polity and civilisation, which had been destroyed by the Aryan conquest and Brahmin hegemony.
[9] Ramasamy expounded the Hindu epic Ramayana as a disguised historical account of how the Aryans subjugated the Tamils ruled by Ravana.
[11] At the 14th Confederation of the Justice Party held in Madras in 1938, rules and regulations, or precursors of a Dravida Nadu were adopted.
The objectives were defined as: to attain Purna Swaraj and complete control for Dravida Nadu in social, economic and industrial, and commercial fields; to liberate Dravida Nadu and Dravidians from exploitation and domination by aryan foreigners; to acquire for the citizens of Dravida Nadu without discrimination on account of caste and class and inequalities arising there from, in law and society, equal rights and equal opportunities; to remove from the Dravidian people the sense of difference and superstitious beliefs existing in the name of religion, customs, and traditions and unite them as a society of people with a liberal outlook and intellectual development, and to get proportionate representation in all fields till the achievement of these objectives and until the people who have a sense of caste, religious and class differences cooperate with the party in full confidence and goodwill.
Ramasamy as: the area then comprising Madras Presidency; passport system to enter the state; duty on goods from other provinces and entry with permit; demarcation of boundaries according to the needs and convenience of Dravida Nadu; and continuing an existing system of defence till grant of full independence.
[21] In 1940, the South Indian Liberal Federation (Justice Party) passed a resolution demanding a sovereign state of Dravida Nadu.
The proposition was made with a view to safeguarding the national self-respect of Dravidians threatened by Indo-Aryan culture, language, political leadership, and business interests.
A separatist conference was held in June 1940 at Kanchipuram when Ramasamy released the map of the proposed Dravida Nadu.
With the promised grant of full self-government after World War II, and posed another threat to the Indian Freedom Movement However, it failed to get British approval.
On the contrary, Ramasamy received sympathy and support from people such as Bhimrao Ramji Ambedkar and Muhammad Ali Jinnah for his views on the Congress, and for his opposition to Hindi.
[26] Jinnah stated "I have every sympathy and shall do all to help, and you establish Dravidistan where the 7 per cent Muslim population will stretch its hands of friendship and live with you on lines of security, justice and fairplay.
[36] In highlighting the demand for Dravida Nadu, the economics of exploitation by the Hindi-speaking, Aryan, Brahminical North was elaborated upon.
In public meetings that he addressed between March and June 1940, he projected the three-nation doctrine as the only solution which could end the political impasse in the country.
[38] When the political power in Tamil Nadu shifted to the non-Brahmin K. Kamaraj in the 1950s, EVR's DK supported the Congress ministry.
[43] Unlike Khalistan and other separatist movements in Republic of India, DMK never considered violence as a serious option to achieve a separate Dravida Nadu.
[6][7] The non-Tamil Dravidian speakers perceived the ambitions of the Tamil politicians as hegemonic, ultimately leading to the failure of the Dravida Nadu concept.
In November 1960, the DMK leaders, including Raman, decided to delete the demand of Dravida Nadu from the party programme at a meeting held in absence of Annadurai.
[49] The demand for a sovereign Tamil state was considered as a threat of Balkanization to India,[50] and also raised concerns among the Sinhalese politicians in Sri Lanka.
"[51] Annadurai, who had been elected to the upper house of Indian parliament (Rajya Sabha) in 1962, reiterated DMK's demand for independence for Dravida Nadu in his maiden speech on 1 May 1962.
In 2017, when the Indian Ministry of Environment, Forest and Climate Change issued a notification banning the sale of cattle for slaughter, Twitter users from the Kerala state (where beef dishes are popular) protested by trending the hashtag #DravidaNadu.
[60] In February 2024, D. K. Suresh, a Member of Parliament at the time, sparked controversy by suggesting that South India might seek a "separate country" due to perceived fiscal unfairness by the central government.
Although he didn’t use the term "Dravida Nadu," he argued that Southern states were being neglected in the Union Budget, despite contributing significantly to national taxes.
His remarks were met with strong criticism from BJP leaders, including Tejasvi Surya, who accused Suresh of trying to divide the country.
Surya pointed to the increased tax devolution to Karnataka under the NDA government, contrasting it with Congress’s alleged "divide and rule" approach.
R. Ashoka, another BJP leader from Karnataka, condemned Suresh’s statement as divisive, linking it to Congress’s history of partition and contrasting it with Rahul Gandhi’s “Bharat Jodo Yatra,” which focused on unity.
