CHENNAI: One of the finest Tamil laureates and a former Vice-Chancellor of Manomaniam Sundaranar University K P Aravanan (78) passed away at his residence here after a brief illness.
Aravanan who has 56 books to his credit was a native of a small village Kadalangudi in Nagapattinam district. He was also known in drawing up the Tamil syllabus in several universities across the country and was holding various honorary positions abroad as a founder of Tamil chair.
Most of his scholarly works were rare that made him popular among the academic sector, said the founder of South East Asia Tamil Sangam, Indonesia Visakan.
Some of his works included Dravidian Studies, Notable Negroid Elements in Dravidian India, Matriarchy and Mother Goddess, which he compiled in English and presented at the global level when he was holding the position of Director, Centre of Advanced Study in Linguistics, Annamalai 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. He had published over 100 academic books for students of Tamil literature in various universities, Visakan said.
The State government awarded him thrice for his best research works that included the prestigious
Thiruvalluvar award and Tamizhar Thanthai SP Adithanar award for bringing out Tamil culture and its origins to the global arena.
Writers and political leaders have condoled Aravanan’s death. DMK president MK Stalin said, “His interest to improve Tamil language is great and an award has to be constituted in the name of “ Aravanar award”. He had worked to create a revolution in Tamil education.
TNCC president S Thirunavukkarasar said the renowned Tamil scholar had compiled books in all fields of Tamil such as sociology and history. He had 56 books to his credit. PMK founder S Ramadoss said the death of Aravanan, who dedicated his entire life for the improvement of Tamil and development of Tamils, is a great loss to Tamil research”.