பக்கம் எண் :

322THE PRIMARY CLASSICAL LANGUAGE OF THE WORLD

APPENDIX

      The Tamil Renaissance began in the year 1916, when the late MaŠaimalai Adiga˜ of Pallavapuram (Pallƒvaram), the greatest authority on the Tamil language during his lifetime, started the revival of pure Tamil which was flourishing during the pre-Aryan period in all departments of public life, and established beyond a shadow of doubt the possibility of Tamil being employed as a medium of expression of every modern thought, through his literary works on richly varied subjects.

      The movement gathered momentum during the British days, and the Government did not stand in its way, though it didn’t give any active support to it.

      It is an irony of facts that circumstances are becoming more and more unfavourable to Tamil, after the attainment of Political Independence, and the heretic school of Tamil scholars is gaining ascendency over the orthodox school, and this is amply proved by the Kuala Lumpur World Tamil Conference, whose organizers have studiously avoided the participation of the followers of MaŠaimalai Adiga˜ in it.