Six-time Tamil Nadu Chief Minister and one of the most influential leaders of the country J Jayalalithaa passed away at a Chennai hospital on Monday after a cardiac arrest.
The AIADMK chief will today be buried at Chennai’s Marina beach, next to her mentor and former state Chief Minister MG Ramachandran who founded the party she went on to lead.
The news that Jayalalithaa will be buried and not cremated as per the Hindu rituals came as surprise to many as she was a practicing Brahmin and used to pray regularly. The reasons though are more political as one would assume.
An Iyengar, Jayalalithaa was the head of All India Anna Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (AIADMK), a Dravidian political party which had a deep-rooted ideology in atheism.
Dravidian parties were strongly against the Brahminical order and Hindu culture and had denounced their symbols and Gods. Leaders of Dravidian movement, including Periyar, Anna Durai and MGR, were all buried and the burial of Jayalaithaa is keeping in line with the party’s ideology.
“This is part of the Dravidian politics. Dravidian politics has denounced Hindu and Brahmin rituals and follow atheism. Even MGR was buried. The burial of Jayalalithaa is in keeping up with the precept of Dravidian politics although she was a practicing Hindu,” Radhika Ramaseshan, a senior journalist and political commentator, said.
The burial of leaders of Dravidian movement allowed followers to build memorial for them. Considering Jayalalithaa's cult following, a grand memorial for her, besides MGR's, is in the offing.
