Tamil Nadu Timeline

ProtestNational and Dravidian movements

Deaths of Natarajan and Thalamuthu in custody

· Chennai

Anti-Hindi protesters L. Natarajan and Thalamuthu died after being jailed, and were claimed as the first martyrs of the anti-Hindi movement.

L. Natarajan and Thalamuthu were among the protesters jailed during the anti-Hindi agitation. Natarajan was arrested in December 1938 and died on 15 January 1939. Thalamuthu was arrested in February 1939 for picketing the Hindu Theological High School in Madras and died in prison on 11 March 1939; the government attributed his death to illness. Their deaths intensified the protests, and they are commemorated by the Dravidian movement as the first martyrs of the struggle against Hindi imposition.

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