CHENNAI: Former vice-chancellor of Manomanian Sundaranar University and Tamil laureate K P Aravanan (77) passed here at his residence after a brief illness.
K P Aravanan who has 56 books to his credit was a native of a small village called Kadalangudi in Tirunelveli district. Aravanan was also known in constituting the Tamil syllabus in several universities across the country and was also the former VC at the Pondicherry University.
Literature, History and Tamil books in several colleges are some of his works that made the former university vice-chancellor popular among the writing community. The state government awarded him thrice for his best research works that brought out Tamil culture and its origins to the global arena.
Dravidian Studies, Notable Negroid Elements in Dravidian India, Matriarchy and Mother Goddess are some of his popular works in English when he was holding the position of Director, Centre of Advanced Study in Linguistics, Annamalai University.
For the past few years, he was suffering from various ailments and on Sunday he breathed his last at his residence in Chennai. Several Tamil writers and researchers paid their tributes to the renowned writer.