Sir C.P.Ramaswamy Iyer

Sir CP Ramaswami Iyer former Dewan of Thiruvananthapuram ....

Tall handsome he was an impressing personality with great intelligence .

July 12 to 25 .1947 ,are important dates in the history of erstwhile Travancore kingdom .

His Royal Highness Sri Chitra Thirunal Maharaja was an young man .

The Diwan of Travncore Sir C.P and the Maharajas mother were the triumvirate who discussed and decided on matters of state .

It was Sir CP s ideas and projects that made Travancore a rich independent state

But he was also blamed for his dictatorial behavior and developing a police state .

The Congress with its freedom movement never considered Sir CP as being favorable to its freedom struggles and the communists hated him for his violent ending of the Punnapura Vayalar struggle where more than 1000 people died .

At the same time he was the force behind the Maharaja declaring temples open to all Hindus a radical reform those days .

The famous Temple entry proclamation which was much appreciated even by the Mahatma .

CP was known as a ruthless administrator .

History blames him for trying his best to influence the Maharaja and his mother in not joining with India when the British had decided to free the nation shortly .

As a relatively independent nation with its own port in partnership with Cochin ,

Plenty of free trade with foreign countries ,and a rich kingdom with good income its possible for Travanvore for considering so

Most of its industries were started by

Sir CP himself .

In fact most public sector industries of later Kerala like Indian Aluminium company ,

The FACT which was started with help of America in defiance of British irritation on this ,

Factory to manufacture Titanium Dioxide ,

Travancore plywoods at Punalur ,

Travancore Rayons at Perumbavoor ,

Aluminium cables factory at Kundara

Were all started in his tenure !

All that succeeding Indian state Govts of Kerala has ever done is to close many of them .

He developed pallivasal hydroelectric projects and many other dams in the state for power generation and irrigation purposes .

He developed the Travancore University with the Maharaja as chancellor and himself the Vice Chancellor .

Trivandrum Art gallery was expanded by him in 1937 .

Travancore was first part of India with nationalized roads and the 88 km stretch road to Kanyakumari was built of concrete .

Capital punishment was abolished

Adult franchise introduced

First women district judge was appointed .

Ms. Anna Chandy who later became first women high court judge .

Midday meal scheme for poor school children was started by Sir CP and even the famous CM of Tamilnadu M.G.Ramachandran praised this later and followed him .

Several states would follow this later .

What really happened in july 1947 ?

A declaration of Independence by Travancore was signed by Maharaja on july 18 1947 .

There are different opinions on this .

Leftist Historians like Ramachandra Guha felt Sir CP was the villain acting in consort with Britain who wanted to continue their hold on rich monazite resources of Kerala for their nuclear programme , and that CP was in touch with Md Ali Jinnah to hold power against India .

But its also felt that Sir CP wanted just more autonomy and not total independence as a seperate state .

On July 23 talks between CP and powers in Travancore and Indian Govt to be formed made him almost agree ,but for the Maharaja still not deciding .

The Nizam of Hyderabad and Goa under the Portuguese and Kashmir under Hari Singh were other kingdoms still undecided .

But an attempt on life of Sir CP by left forces which he escaped with stab wounds made him speeden up Travancore joining India .

Was Sir Chetput Pattabhiraman Ramaswamy Iyer shortly called Sir CP the autocratic traitor of India ?

or was he a clever able and strict administrator who acted on pressure !

A question needing deeper research .

Post Independence Sir CP went all over the world held important positions , taught in universities in US ,

In 1966 he had gone for researching for a book to the UK where he collapsed and died during the course of an interview instantaneously .

In short active till his last breath .

Will History and should history judge Sir CP Rsmasawamy Iyer more benevolently ?

12Sandhya Menon, Biju Sreedharan and 10 others

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