A young Pulavar Se.rasu must have stood fascinated in front of the inscription, when, for the first time, he spelled out a Sangam age name on it.
How old could Erode Pulavar Se. Rasu be when he showed the stone inscriptions on a hillock at Arachalur to veteran epigraphist Mayilai Seeni. Venkatasamy? Rasu bade farewell to the world last Wednesday, 9th of August, 2023 at the age of 85. If his memorable incident of showing Venkatasamy the stone inscriptions is calculated backward from the day of his demise, it could be over 60 years.
Since it happened in the early 1960s, Rasu must have been a 25-year-old young man when he stood near Mayilai. Seeni. Venkatasamy at the stone inscription.
He could not have got the historic incident photographed, for possessing a camera was a luxury at those times. Still, when this writer shared the anecdote with Cine Arts V. Jeevananthan, the city-based famed artist, it sparked the idea in him to do a line drawing, depicting Rasu with the elderly epigraphist Venkatasamy at the inscription.
Rasu and his friends took the estampage of the inscriptions and sent them to the journals Swadesamitran and Senthamizh Chelvi, and they carried the historic news to the world of Tamils. One of the inscriptions, which mentions a man’s gifting of stone beds for the Jain monks on the hill Nagamalai at Arachalur, says that one by the name “Mania Vannakkan Devan Saathan” not only made the stone beds but also inscribed the letters on the stone, as it reads “Ezhuthum Punaruthaan Maniya ‘Vannakkan’ Devan Saathan” The inscription which dates back to the 2nd century A.D. takes the reader to the last years of the Sangam age and reminds the similar names of the men mentioned in Sangam lyrics. A bard by the name “Pudhukayaththu Vannakkan Kambur Kizhar penned the 294th song in Nattrinai, a Sangam period work. Similarly, another bard by the name Vadama ‘Vannakkan’ Damodharanaar penned the 85th song in Kurunthogai, another Sangam period work. Also, a bard by the name ‘Vannakkan’ Chorumarunkumaranaar sang the 257th song in Natrinai.
With the word ‘Vannakkan’ connoting a merchant of precious stones, the man who had the stone beds made and gifted them to the Jain monks must also be the one, as Kongunadu was rich in precious and semiprecious stones.
The young Pulavar Se.rasu must have stood fascinated in front of the inscription, when, for the first time, he spelled out a Sangam age name on it. An author of over 100 books, Rasu was also the first historian to notice another stone inscription at the disused Rajakesari Peruvazhi - the oldest highway of India that ran across Coimbatore connecting the east and west seashores in ancient times.
When Rasu came to the village Sundakkamuthur on the outskirts of Coimbatore to speak in a Pattimandram some four decades ago, the moderator on the dais gave an exceptional introduction to him saying that Rasu was not just an orator but a good epigraphist too. And this introduction brought a member of the audience before Rasu and made him inform him that there was an inscription on a slab of rock in the forest of Madukkarai. As he requested him to join a team of people from Sundakamuthur and study the inscription, Rasu entered the forest with the team, found the inscription, and informed the eminent epigraphist R.Poongundran about it. The history of Coimbatore has recorded Poongundran deciphered the inscription at the Rajakesari Peruvazhi after researching it for over twenty years.
A great writer, epigraphist, literateur, and historian, Rasu deciphered and published the two pieces of literature Appachimar Kaviyam and Gurukula Kaviyam of the Vettuvars – the tribe he calls the natives of Kongunadu.
Living a life full of history, epigraphy, and literature, Rasu also deciphered the copperplate grants and palm leaf manuscripts of the ancient Kongunadu and compiled them into a voluminous book with the title Kongunaattu Samuthaaya Aavanangal. Beginning his career as a school teacher and completing his academic service as Head of the Department of Epigraphy and Archaeology, Tamil University, Thanjavur, Rasu’s cup of tea was just reading, researching, and writing.
When he was burnt, clouds of smoke from the crematorium’s chimney looked as if his erudition in Kongu history were entering the vast firmament, which is not so vast as his wisdom.