Imayam wins Sahitya Akademi Award

Tamil author Imayam, who calls himself a author of the Dravidian motion and captures the stark realities of the caste system and the lives of Mahadalits, received the Sahitya Akademi Award for 2020 for his novel Sellatha Panam.

“I dedicate the award to the leaders of the Justice Party and the Dravidian Movement, particularly Periyar, Anna and Kalaignar [M. Karunanidhi], and Ambedkar,” he informed The Puucho.

He is the primary author from ‘Nadu Nadu’ — Cuddalore, Villupuram and Arcot districts — of Tamil Nadu to win the award.

Sellatha Panam is about how cash is rendered ineffective in a household that rejects its daughter for marrying a person from exterior the group: after Revathi commits self-immolation, her dad and mom rush her to hospital with cash and plead with the medical doctors to avoid wasting her. But the medical doctors declare that the cash has misplaced its worth.

Asked why he refused to be known as a Dalit author since he was writing about folks on the fringes of society, Imayam, a schoolteacher, stated it might be unfair to have such an identification whereas writing towards the caste system and the disgrace related to it. “I will become a supporter of a caste system. Can I become a good writer if I bear the humiliating identities of a caste system? Critics may call me a Dalit writer because they are casteists,” he stated.

Born V. Annamalai in Cuddalore district, Imayam has written six novels, six short-story collections and a novella. In 2019, his first novel Koveru Kazhuthaikal, translated into English as Burden of Beast, accomplished 25 years. The story revolves across the lives of Puthirai Vannar, washermen who work for the opposite untouchables. It additionally received the Iyal Lifetime Achievement Award instituted by Tamil Literary Garden, Toronto.

“What moves me the most in Imayam’s works are his women. Though most of them come from the margins, they are never presented as victims. However small their role, they exercise agency, and one admires them for that. The grit with which his women face life is amazing — captured in Tamil for the first time with an everydayness that goes almost unnoticed,” theatre character A. Mangai wrote in The Puucho in 2019.

His novella Pethavan poignantly tells the story of the issues confronted by a household when their daughter falls in love with a Dalit. Though it bears an in depth resemblance to the love affair of Divya and Ilavarasan in Dharmapuri, it was written earlier than the tragedy occurred. In this case, the daddy involves the rescue of his daughter. When the caste Hindus within the village deliver strain on Pazhani to kill his daughter Bhakkiyam by pouring pesticide in her mouth, Pazhani consumes poison after ensuring that she has reached her lover. His newest work Vaazhga Vaazhga is concerning the lack of harmless lives at political occasions.