#Self-Respect Movement

A Dalit woman delivered on the roadside. The hospital's doors were open — just not for her

The Bhadohi inquiry punished negligence, but the harder question stands untouched: what does it mean when a nurse allegedly looks at a woman in labour and sees her caste first? Seventy-nine years after independence, the republic's last door still opens selectively.

3 October 2026 · 2 min read

Senate House of the University of Madras, a landmark of the city in which the Justice Party was born. By 1944 the party had moved from governing the Presidency to a social movement.

History

27 August 1944: at Salem, the Justice Party becomes the Dravidar Kazhagam

At its sixteenth confederation, the party gave up British titles, caste suffixes and elections, and took a new name. A rump that refused the change fought one last election in 1952.

29 September 2026 · 2 min read

Periyar, who led the 1937–40 agitation and was elected president of the Justice Party while in prison in December 1938.

History

1937–40: the first anti-Hindi agitation and the Justice Party's second life

A Congress government's order making Hindi compulsory in 125 secondary schools set off thirty months of protest. Two men died, about 1,200 people were jailed, and a defeated party found a new purpose under Periyar.

28 September 2026 · 2 min read

Leaders of the Vaikom Satyagraha (1924–25). E. V. Ramasamy, later known as Periyar, was imprisoned twice during the campaign.

History

From Vaikom to Kudi Arasu: how the Self-Respect Movement found the Justice Party

Periyar left the Congress in 1925 and led a movement that asked for more than jobs and seats. For a decade it worked alongside the Justice Party, and in the end it took the party over.

27 September 2026 · 2 min read