There is still being a controversy over the question, whether Sanskrit is living or dead, and much time, energy, and material have been wasted especially on the Sanskrit side though Rev. Richard Morris stamped Sanskrit as dead as early as 1897. But strictly speaking, Sanskrit is neither dead nor living. It was never born, and so it never died. Its existence is only like that of a puppet.

If anybody speaks Sanskrit as fluently as any other living language, he is only to be admired and appreciated, even as an artiste is applauded, on account of his performance of rare feats; but, it can never serve as an evidence to prove that Sanskrit is a living language. There are persons to speak even perfectly artificial languages like Esperanto and Novial, not only fluently but also oratorically.

The false belief that Sanskrit was the parent of all Prƒkrits and enricher of Tamil, has led philologists to derive many Tamil words from their Sanskrit corruptions through Prƒkrit in a topsyturvy fashion.

Some Prƒkrit corruptions of Tamil are arbitrarily connected with radically different Sanskrit words.
e.g. Sanskrit Prakrit Tamil

ƒrya ajja accan
stambha khambha kambam

‘Kambam’ is an augmentative of ‘kambu’, stick, pole, and ‘accan’ a corruption of ‘attan’, father.