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Kamaraj – An inspiration for today’s Children's

EARLY LIFE OF KUMARASAMI KAMARAJ:

The early life of Kamaraj remains in bold letters in the writings of Indians history. On July 15, 1903, in the tiny town of Virdunagar , Tamil Nadu, and a baby boy was born. Born in a family of traders to Kumarasamy Nadar and Sivakami Ammal, he was named Kumaraswamy Kamaraj Nadar. His father, Kumarasamy, was a coconut merchant who used to sell coconuts for a living, thus his family was not on the rich end and Kamarajhad to start from this humble beginning. His name was affectionately shortened to Raja by his mother. Kamaraj’s life could only be made difficult by death of his father, and his mother was left to sell all the jewelry except the earrings to care for the entire family. Kamaraj has one of the most successful cheif ministers of Tamilnadu and a powerful politician in Indian politics, yet he did not even complete his high school due to poverty.

GOOD GOVERNANCE:

K Karamaj was to become one of the greats in the Indian politics. He was an Indian politician widely known as the “the Kingmaker” in Indian politics during the 1960s. In the period from 1954-1963, he was the chief minister of Tamil Nadu and also a member of parliament between 1952-1954 and 1969-1975.

Kamaraj’s drew his inspiration from a political guru, S. Satyamurti, an orator and a parliamentarian. Satyamurti had found an efficient, loyal, skillful organizer and indefatigable worker in Kamaraj. They both had a very good friendship and could complement each other’s skill. When Satyamurti was elected as the President of Provincial Congress in 1936, he appointed Kamaraj as the General Secretary. After four years they swapped their positions and the party base became much strengthened under their stewardship. Kamaraj’s devotion to Satyamurti was so much that when the country gained independence, he went first to Satyamurti and hoisted the Indian flag at his house. On his election as a Chief Minister, Kamaraj went back, garlanded his photo and paid his tribute and respect to the leader’s window.

EDUCATION:

During his time as a Chief Minister, Kamaraj did away with the earlier family vocation based Hereditary Education Policy that had been introduced by Rajaji. After the change, the school education system went under revolution and that saw opening of new schools under the new policies. In the poor rural areas, students were to walk not more than 3 miles to get to the nearest school and better facilities were also part of the package. When Karamaj realised humgry children could not focus in their school he introduced the Midday Meal Scheme, it was meant to provide at least one meal per day to the poor school children.

The mid day meal scheme was a great success since the parents were happy to send their children to school since they would get healthy meal and for the kids they can focus on learning with a full stomach.

Furthermore, the students were provided with free school uniforms to weed out creed and class distinctions among the developing young minds.