Death of the young satyagrahi Thillaiyadi Valliammai
Valliammai, a 16-year-old daughter of Tamil immigrants from Thillaiyadi, died after imprisonment in Gandhi's South African satyagraha.
Valliamma Munuswamy Mudaliar was born in Johannesburg in 1898 to a couple who had emigrated from Thillaiyadi village in the Tanjore district. In October 1913 she and her mother joined a batch of Transvaal women who went to Natal to persuade Indian workers to strike against the three pound tax, and she was imprisoned. She fell ill in prison and died shortly after her release, on 22 February 1914. Gandhi wrote about her sacrifice in Satyagraha in South Africa, and she is remembered in Tamil Nadu as an early figure of the Indian struggle abroad.
