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K Damodaran | |
|---|---|
 | |
| Member of Parliament ofRajya Sabha | |
| In office 1964–1970 | |
| Constituency | Kerala |
| Personal details | |
| Born | (1912-02-05)5 February 1912 |
| Died | 3 July 1976(1976-07-03) (aged 64) |
| Nationality | Indian |
| Political party | Communist Party of India |
| Occupation | Communist ideologue, Writer & Politician |
Keezhedathu Damodaran[1] (25 February 1912 – 3 July 1976) was an IndianMarxist theoretician, writer and one of the leaders of theCommunist Party of India inKerala,India.
Damodaran was born to Kizhakkiniyakath Thuppan Nampoothiri and Keezhedathu Narayani Amma inPonnani inMalappuram district. He had his schooling in Government School, Tirur, and college education inSamoothiri College, Calicut. His first socialist activities were associated with being secretary of the student movement 'Kerala Students Movement' and he joined the freedom struggle. He was arrested in 1931 for participating in thecivil disobedience movement and sentenced to rigorous imprisonment for 23 months. While inCoimbatore jail, he learnedTamil andHindi. He went toKasi (UP) in 1935 to studySanskrit from theViswa Vidyalaya there and passed the Shastri examination. While at Kasi he learnedUrdu andBengali and was attracted to Communist ideology.
Lal Bahadur Shastri was his classmate. He was attracted to Communist ideology through his senior Onkar Nadashasthri. Thus he became a Communist – the first 'Malayalee Communist'. He returned to Kerala in 1937 and joined theKerala Socialist Party and in May the same year formed the Kerala unit of theCommunist Party of India. He organizedCoir andBeedi workers. He was imprisoned twice and released in 1945. In 1951, he was elected as theTaluk secretary of theMalabar unit committee of the Communist Party. He contested the assembly election in 1951 and theLoksabha election in 1957. Damodaran was elected to the central executive committee of the party in 1960. He took charge of editing theNavayugam weekly. All through these years he was intellectually active by way of writing articles and books, learning new languages and debating on various forums.
He became aRajya sabha member (MP) in 1964. He visited many Asian and European countries including almost all of the communist nations. After the tenure, he devoted his time to a comprehensive research on the history of the Party at(JNU) under anICHR fellowship.He was the first progressive writer in Malayalam. 'pattabakki' was the first political drama to be staged in kerala which, in a way, paved the way for the advancement of communist ideology among the common people. He dwelled deep into Indian Philosophy which was considered solely spiritual until then and discovered new streams of material thoughts in it. His celebrated works 'Bharatheeya Chintha' and 'Indiayude athmavu' speaks volumes of the metamorphosis. He was a multilinguist and could speak for hours on thought provoking subjects.
He died on July 3, 1976, inDelhi at theSafdarjung Hospital while he was still conducting this research. Damodaran was a multilingual scholar and translated many books fromRussian toMalayalam. Apart fromPattabaakki, he wrote another play namedRakthapanam. The stories written between 1934 and 1935 are now a collection known asKannuneer. In all his works, party popularization was seen. The best known of his works isIndiyude Atmavu and in English, an excellent exposition of 'Indian Culture' and 'Philosophy from the ancient times'. He completed only first part ofKerala History based on archeology, anthropology and coin sciences.
His critical insights on the global Communist movement, and particularly the Indian Communist movement, were thoroughly discussed in an interview conducted byTariq Ali in 1975, which was published inNew Left Review, Sept.-Oct. 1975).
Political activist and documentary directorK. P. Sasi is the son of Damodaran.
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