White turban, moustache, black coat, panchakacchaam style dhoti – these are the images that come to mind when one hears the name Subramania Bharati (Bharatiyar) But how can a fiery leader Tamil poets The idea of wearing a turban came up, which was not common at that time Tamil NaduIn addition he kept a long moustache and cut his hair short, which was unusual among Brahmins at that time, and did not wear the sacred thread on his head. In addition, for many years he did not write a single poem.
The search for answers leads to Kashi. What really happened during Bharati’s time? KashiAnd how did it shape or perhaps harm his life, unlike Periyar, whose visit there made him a rationalist?
Much of the Tamil population observed Bharati’s 103rd death anniversary on September 11, though without the pomp and show of the celebrations held in 2021.
Bharathi, popularly known as ‘Mahakavi’, has been a guide in the Tamil literary world for decades. He sowed the seeds of ‘Mahakavi’.pudhukavithai‘ (New Poetry in Tamil) tradition. Yet, even 142 years after his birth, a large part of his life remains in the dark.
For decades Bharati researchers have been trying to fill in the gaps in the poet’s life, times and work, giving rise to a new field of study – ‘indology‘The need to address these gaps resurfaces every year on his birth and death anniversaries, especially now, with the central government setting up a chair in the poet’s name at Bandra Hindu University and celebrating ‘Bharatiya Bhasha Diwas’ on his birth anniversary, which was announced during the inauguration of the Kashi Tamil Sangamam in 2022. Since then, his Kashi sojourn has also attracted renewed interest, especially amid criticism that the BJP is co-opting celebrities like Bharati to promote a Hindutva agenda.
Let us first know why the poet went to Kashi, where he stayed between 1898 and 1904. Earlier, in 1896, he was working as a court poet in the province of Ettayapuram. Due to the misbehavior of the head of the province, the zamindar, Bharati had to resign from the post and went to Kashi for higher education.
This was the time when the coronation of Prince Edward VII was being celebrated across the country, with the expenses being borne by the state exchequer. The government’s focus on these festivities at a time when the country was reeling from the famines of the 1900s angered nationalists, especially in the northern regions of British India, where protests were intense. “Those protests must have awakened the spirit of nationalism among the Bharatis and helped them develop social consciousness,” says Seeni Viswanathan, a pioneer of Indianology.
“Though Bharati spent time in Kashi, there is no documentation of his days there,” says Yaa Manikandan, head of the Tamil department at Madras University. “I spent a month in Kashi and visited the places where he is said to have stayed. I found no concrete evidence for claims such as his meeting with Annie Besant, passing the entrance exam for Central Hindu College, reading Shelley on the banks of the Ganges or his writings during his time there.”
Scholars have not been able to find works written by the poet during that period, which is why Viswanathan, who has recorded Bharati’s works chronologically, has also skipped that period. However, Bharati has left some hints in his work such as ‘Chinna Sankaran Kathai’ (a semi-autobiographical tale) and poems like ‘Kavitha Devi Arul Vendal’ where he calls himself a ‘pig in penance’ in those six years (a reference to a story from the Puranas in which a saint is cursed to be reborn as a pig).
The reference to the pig inspired documentary filmmaker Bharathi Krishnakumar to conduct research, resulting in a book titled ‘Arundavapandri’ (roughly translated as ‘a pig in penance’) published in 2011.
“Before me, Viswanathan and lyricist Vaira Muthu had said that Bharati did not write anything for six years. But they did not know the reason. I studied his works thoroughly and tried to piece together his pieces,” says Krishnakumar. However, it is still a mystery why Bharati chose not to write about this period.
Did the time spent in Kashi influence Bharati spiritually? Researchers say this is a grey area. Poet and scholar Kadarkarai claims Bharati may have been the first Tamilian to visit Kashi not for spiritual pilgrimage but for education. “Bharati has written that it was in Kashi that he cut his sacred thread. And the changes in his outward appearance suggest that his days in Kashi moulded him into a poet with a social consciousness rather than influencing him spiritually,” says Kadarkarai.
Researchers have several theories about the moustache and the turban. One is that Bharati’s classmates asked him about shaving off his moustache every week, wondering if it was because he was mourning the death of a family member, as is customary in northern India. Bharati initially explained that it was because it was not common for Brahmins to have a moustache, but later thought it was appropriate to keep it. Regarding the turban, scholars say it was because Bharati was going bald and liked the idea of covering his head.
