Tamil Nadu Timeline

LanguageNational and Dravidian movements

Maraimalai Adigal starts the Pure Tamil movement

· Chennai

Maraimalai Adigal starts the Pure Tamil movement
India Post, Government of India, GODL-India · Wikimedia Commons

Maraimalai Adigal pledged to use Tamil free of Sanskrit loanwords, starting the Tanittamil Iyakkam (Pure Tamil movement).

Maraimalai Adigal, a Saivite scholar and writer, publicly committed himself in 1916 to writing and speaking a pure Tamil devoid of Sanskrit loanwords. This marked the start of the Tanittamil Iyakkam, or Pure Tamil movement. The movement linked language purism with Tamil cultural identity and was later carried forward by writers such as Bharathidasan and Devaneya Pavanar. It influenced the language politics of the Dravidian movement.

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