Identity and the New Rhetorics of Contention: The Vanniyar Mobilisation in Tamil Nadu in the 1980s

The Vanniyar caste became an important political player in Tamil Nadu in the 1980s, a decade widely acknowledged as a crucial and interesting decade in Indian politics in general and Tamil politics in particular. The Vanniyar caste mobilisation that re-emerged in this period indicates the changes in articulation that are important to our understanding of caste politics and social movements. This article highlights the process by which Vanniyar mobilisation initially emerged to represent caste concerns and later negotiated electoral politics. This process involved going beyond caste concerns and the inclusion of issues related to language, ethnicity, concerns of backward classes, and Tamil ‘common masses.’ The article maps the dynamics in the trajectory of Vanniyar mobilisation in the 1980s by bringing to light the shifts in concerns and identity claims. It thereby points to the nature of caste mobilisation in contemporary times, particularly within the larger context of an anti-caste initiative in the form of the Dravidian movement/politics.