“Kainaattugalukku pirandha kaiyezhuthukkal naangal (We are signatures born to thumbprints),“ says Sarath Kumar, 30, a first-generation graduate. He is one of the founding members of Vyasai Thozhargal, a youth community that teaches, at its tuition centre, around 260 under-privileged school students, free of cost, under the banner of Dr. Ambedkar Pagutharivu Padasalai in Vyasarpadi, Chennai.
Along with Sarath and Prem Kumar, 30, (president of Vyasai Thozhargal) are 11 others, all first-generation Dalit graduates, who form the core team of the 50-member community. The friends came together to give back to their area, which has always been at the receiving end of stereotypes about its working-class people, their lives and culture. Vyasarpadi, located in north Chennai, has for long been portrayed as a den of rowdyism and crime in Tamil cinema and media.
On both sides of the entrance to the tuition centre, posters of Ambedkar and the Preamble of the Constitution adorn the walls. Inside, under the banner of Dr. Ambedkar Pagutharivu Padasalai, photographs of Periyar E.V. Ramasamy and Ambedkar welcome visitors; trophies and shields won by the community are stacked over desktops. A notice at the doorway advises students not to wear rings, chains, earrings (for boys), smartwatches and hand bands. “Some students can afford to wear these things while others cannot. We do not want them to see differences between themselves,” says Sarath.
Also Read | Ambedkar & Periyar: On the same page
The tuition centre has produced 100 per cent results (all enrolled students have passed their school exams) in the nine years of its existence.
Shaktivel, 29, a BBA graduate and documentary filmmaker, is also a key member of Vyasai Thozhargal. When he went to college in Besant Nagar, he was called “Vyasarpadi” by his classmates: this was not a mark of respect but came with prejudices about the locality. “Being discriminated against for being a resident of Vyasarpadi has always been the case. But we decided to collectively address this,” says Shaktivel.
The volunteers of Vyasai Thozhargal | Photo Credit: By special arrangement
Shaktivel and Sarath quoted Ambedkar’s words “Educate, Agitate, Organise” and said they chose the word “educate” and decided to work sincerely towards achieving it. The centre also trains students on how to identify social issues and file RTI applications related to them. When students bring in their questions, teachers assist them with grammar and phrasing. Students are also taught to raise complaints through “Namma Chennai”, a public grievance redressal app on smart phones.
Dinesh, a Class X student enrolled in the tuition centre, comes from a single-parent family. He has filed two RTIs so far: one, seeking information about the implementation of the Right to Education Act (RTE) at a local private school; two, about the roads in Vyasarpadi. “Students studying under RTE Act are made to feel inferior and eventually thrown out of schools,” says a teacher at the centre.
From filing nominations to canvassing voters to casting votes, Vyasai Thozhargal organises a model electoral process for students, to keep them informed about polity. In the model Assembly election held recently, Dinesh was elected the speaker of the house. Students like Harish, Kalai Vendhan, Nishita hold “Sports”, “Differently-abled Welfare”, and “Telecommunication” portfolios.
In 2020, Vyasai Makkal Nala Sangam (Vyasai Thozhargal) was registered under the Tamil Nadu Societies Registration Act, 1975. Students from schools in the five-kilometre radius are enrolled at Vyasai Thozhargal. Most of them are from government and government-aided schools, while a few are from private schools.
Vyasai Thozhargal now also teaches kabaddi, silambam, chess, and carrom. The primary purpose is to keep the students engaged. | Photo Credit: By Special Arrangement
Usha, 33, an electronics and communications engineering graduate, who works as a customs house agent at shipping, comes for classes at Vyasai Thozhargal every evening after work. Her nephew Sharvin is also enrolled at the tuition centre. “The environment [in the neighbourhood] is not ideal. There are many ways children get distracted. As long as they are inside [Vyasai Thozhargal], they remain safe,” says Usha. Locals tell Frontline that drug abuse and teenage pregnancies are major problems in the locality and that Vyasai Thozhargal was acting as a protective shield against them.
The origin story
“Ambedkar was a beacon of hope for us and made us realise the importance of education,” says Shakti. The key members, when young, individually had the thought of starting a “tuition centre of sorts” for the children of Vyasarpadi, which they occasionally shared with each other while playing games.
Many decades ago, for the people migrating to this area (from localities such as Thideer Nagar, Parrys and Cheyyur), eight streets were allotted under Jagjivan Ram Nagar, following which, plots were allotted to families without pattas. The lands belonged to the State’s Slum Clearance Board. “At the end of every street, they assigned a piece of land for public utility. No allotment was made under anybody’s name. But later, people with money and muscle power started taking up one plot after the other,” says Sarath.
The last piece of land standing was the one in fourth street, and there was intense competition to claim rights over it: the land where Dr. Ambedkar Pagutharivu Padasalai stands today. “The story of the land is like that of the ‘wall’ and the conflicts around it in the film Madras (2015),” says Sarath.
Also Read | Rescuing Ambedkar
As young boys, Prem, Shakti, Sarath and others played in the plot, which had a well and was used as a dumpyard by the locals. Prem, who is fondly called “Vella” (white) among his friends, along with Sarath, decided to do something about it. Around 2014, when the two friends discussed cleaning up the land, they feared it would attract those who have already laid their eyes on the land. But their reputation of being academically bright helped Sarath and Prem win the trust of their neighbours. They made pamphlets with an image of the dumpyard with the caption: “Indraiya kazhivukkoodam, naam manadhu vaithaal naalaiya kalvikkoodam (Today’s dump yard will be tomorrow’s education centre, if we wish for it).”
To reach out to the people in an organised manner, the friends called themselves “Vyasai Vaaliba Viruchangal” (Vyasai Youth Tree) and launched a signature campaign. “Today, as Vyasai Thozhargal, we can go to the people and convince them of our plans, but back then the only thing we could communicate to people was our imagination,” recalls Sarath.
By 2016, a tuition centre was established at Prem’s house, 10x10 sq ft in size. In 2017, they moved to a friends’ house, and used its terraces. Here, Vijayalakshmi, a B.Com graduate, agreed to teach children. But that year, no students enrolled. “When in Class XII, our pocket money was Rs.5 per day. During our college days, at the end of the day, we would be left with Rs.10. We used to save up that money. From 2012 to 2016, our work was cleaning up the land and raise the ground level [to protect it from floods],” says Sarath.
More than maths
In 2017, they started an “undiyal vasool” (a form of crowd sourcing) in the area. But instead of money, the public were encouraged to contribute bricks, sand, cement, wires, lamps, fans and tables. “All of us worked day and night, assisted by one or two masons and carpenters, and completed the work within a week in December 2019 and inaugurated the place. Many of us even lost our jobs in the process,” Sarath adds.
Vyasai Thozhargal was a result of a group of friends who came together to give back to their area, which has always been at the receiving end of class- and caste-based stereotypes. | Photo Credit: By Special Arrangement
Vyasai Thozhargal now also teaches kabaddi, silambam, chess, and carrom. The primary purpose is to keep the students engaged. “Winning competitions is secondary.” Pavithra Priyadarshini, who has won medals at the South Asian Silambam Championship and was posted as tournament director of the first World Silambam Cup, 2019, held at Malaysia, trains students at Vyasai Thozhargal in silambam.
In 2021, at the height of the COVID-19 pandemic, the group used crowdfunding to rent out autorickshaws, converting them into mini ambulances that carried oxygen cylinders for emergency care and transported people to hospitals free of cost. Whenever the city is inundated with floods, Vyasai Thozhargal steps in to provide relief packages and food to people in the neighbourhood.
Prem tells Frontline: “Our organisation travels in the path of leaders like Ambedkar and Periyar. We take their ideas and work to the people through campaigns. Our goal is to elevate students to power. As a long-term vision, we are hoping our people also get political power.”
An eviction notice
In October 2023, Vyasai Thozhargal was served an eviction notice by the Tamil Nadu Urban Habitat Development Board (TNUHDB). In response, when members of the group met officials from the TNUHDB, they were told that a person filed a complaint alleging the place was used for anti-social activities. Even when government officials visited the site and enquired about the group in the surrounding areas, people only had positive things to say. “The people are our biggest support in holding this place together,” says Sarath.
The group was also awarded Nambikkai Award by Vikatan Publications in 2021. In December 2023, Vyasai Thozhargal, in collaboration with Palani Studio, Chennai Climate Action Group, and PARI organised a photography exhibition, converting the housing board neighbourhood into an open gallery.
Gomathi, 43, a domestic worker, has two daughters Dharini and Vigneshwari, studying in Classes X and XII respectively. “We did not have the opportunity to study. Our daughters will be the first graduates in our family if things go well,” she says. “Vyasai Thozhargal should spread its roots and continue for a long time. The people behind the tuition centre have been facing challenges but they have our support.”
