C. Sankaran Nair
{{Short description|Indian politician (1857–1934)}}
{{Given name hatnote|Sankaran Nair|Chettur|lang=Malayali}}
{{Use dmy dates|date=December 2020}}
{{Use Indian English|date=July 2018}}
{{Infobox officeholder
| honorific-prefix = Sir
| name = Chettur Sankaran Nair
| honorific-suffix = CIE
| image = SirChetturSankaranNair.jpg
| imagesize =
| caption =
| birth_date = {{Birth date|df=yes|1857|07|11}}
| birth_place = Palghat, Malabar District, Madras Presidency, British India
(present day Palakkad, Kerala, India)
| residence =
| death_date = {{Death date and age|df=yes|1934|04|24|1857|07|11}}
| death_place = Madras, Madras Presidency, British India
(now Chennai, Tamil Nadu, India)
| office1 = Advocate-General of Madras
| term_start1 = 1906
| term_end1 = 1908
| predecessor1 = C. A. White
| successor1 = Sir P. S. Sivaswami Iyer
| office2 = President of the Indian National Congress
| term_start2 = {{Start date|1897||}}
| term_end2 = {{End date|1897||}}
| predecessor2 = Rahimtulla M. Sayani
| successor2 = Anandamohan Bose
| party = Indian National Congress
| spouse =
| children =
| profession = {{hlist|Lawyer|Jurist|Activist|Politician}}
| footnotes =
| signature =
| office = Justice of the High Court of Madras
| term_start = {{Start date|1908||}}
| term_end = {{End date|1915||}}
}}
Sir Chettur Sankaran Nair CIE (11 July 1857 – 24 April 1934) was an Indian lawyer and statesman who served as the Advocate-General of Madras from 1906 to 1910, on the High Court of Madras as a puisne justice from 1910 to 1915, and as India-wide Education minister as a member of the Viceroy's Executive Council from 1915 until 1919. He was elected president of the 1897 Indian National Congress, and led the Egmore faction, opposing the Mylapore group.
According to V. C. Gopalratnam, he was a leader of the Madras bar, alongside C. R. Pattabhirama Iyer, M. O. Parthasarathy Iyengar, V. Krishnaswamy Iyer, P. R. Sundaram Iyer, and Sir V. C. Desikachariar, and immediately behind Sir V. Bhashyam Aiyangar and Sir S. Subramania Iyer.{{Cite book |last=Gopalratnam |first=V. C. |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=7-pPAQAAIAAJ |title=A Century Completed: A History of the Madras High Court, 1862-1962 |date=1962 |publisher=Madras Law Journal Office |language=en}} He wrote Gandhi and Anarchy (1922).{{cite journal |last1=Collett |first1=Nigel A. |title=The O'Dwyer v. Nair Libel Case of 1924: New Evidence Concerning Indian Attitudes and British Intelligence During the 1919 Punjab Disturbances |journal=Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society |date=2011 |volume=21 |issue=4 |pages=469–483 |doi=10.1017/S1356186311000435 |jstor=41490046 |url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/41490046 |issn=1356-1863|url-access=subscription}}
Early life and education
Chettur Sankaran Nair was born on 11 July 1857{{cite web |title=Sankaran Nair {{!}} Making Britain |url=https://www5.open.ac.uk/research-projects/making-britain/content/sankaran-nair |website=www5.open.ac.uk |publisher=British Library |access-date=20 April 2025}} in a prominent family named Chettur, as the son of Parvathy Amma Chettur and Mammayil Ramunni Panicker of the Mammayil family, in Mankara, Palakkad district.{{cite book |last1=Nair |first1=Chettur Madhavan |title=A Short Life of Sir C. Sankaran Nair, C. I. E.: (fighter for India's Freedom) Member of the Viceroy's Executive Council |date=1969 |page=7 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=-p4sAAAAMAAJ&pg=PA7 |language=en}} Sankaran Nair got his family name, Chettur, through matrilineal succession.
His father worked as a Tahsildar under the British government. His early education began in the traditional style at home and continued in schools in Malabar, till he passed the arts examination with a first class from the Provincial School at Kozhikode. Then he joined the Presidency College, Madras. In 1877 he took his arts degree, and two years later secured the law degree from the Madras Law College.
Career
Nair started as a lawyer in 1880 in the High Court of Madras. In 1884, the Madras Government appointed him as a member of the committee for an enquiry into the district of Malabar. Till 1908, he was the Advocate-General to the Government and an Acting Judge from time to time. In 1908, he became a permanent Judge in the High Court of Madras and held the post till 1915. He was a part of the bench that tried Collector Ashe murder case along with C. A. White, then the Chief Justice of Madras, William Ayling, as a special case.[http://madrasmusings.com/Vol%2019%20No%208/The_Ashe_murder_case.html We care for Madras that is Chennai]. Madras Musings (17 June 1911). Retrieved on 2012-06-11. In his best-known judgment, he upheld conversion to Hinduism and ruled that such converts were not outcasts. He founded and edited the Madras Review and the Madras Law Journal.{{Cite web |title=Sir Chettur Sankaran Nair {{!}} Indian lawyer, politician, reformer {{!}} Britannica |url=https://www.britannica.com/biography/Chettur-Sankaran-Nair |access-date=2024-03-05 |website=www.britannica.com |language=en}}
In the meantime, in 1902, the Viceroy Lord Curzon appointed him Secretary to the Raleigh University Commission. In recognition of his services, he was appointed a Companion of the Indian Empire by the King-Emperor in 1904[http://www.london-gazette.co.uk/issues/27688/supplements/4010 London Gazette, 21 June 1904] and in 1912 he was knighted.[http://www.london-gazette.co.uk/issues/28626/supplements/5082 London Gazette, 12 July 1912] He became a member of the Viceroy's Council in 1915 with the charge of the Education portfolio. As member, he wrote in 1919 two Minutes of Dissent in the Despatches on Indian Constitutional Reforms, pointing out the various defects of British rule in India and suggesting reforms. The British government accepted most of his recommendations.
Nair resigned from the Viceroy's Council in the aftermath of Jallianwalla Bagh massacre on 13 April 1919. Afterward he was a councillor to the secretary of state for India (in London, 1920–21) and a member of the Indian Council of State (from 1925).
He played an active part in the Indian National movement which was gathering force in those days. In 1897, when the First Provincial Conference met in Madras, he was invited to preside over it. The same year, when the Indian National Congress assembled at Amravati, he was chosen its president. In a masterly address, he referred to the highhandedness of foreign administration, called for reforms and asked for self-government for India with Dominion Status. In 1900, he was a member of the Madras Legislative Council. His official life from 1908 to 1921 interrupted his activities as a free political worker. In 1928, he was the President of the Indian Central Committee to co-operate with the Simon Commission.{{cite book|author=Gautam Sharma|title=Nationalisation of the Indian Army, 1885–1947|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=siDiyYi8k74C&pg=PA113|access-date=11 June 2012|date=1 January 1996|publisher=Allied Publishers|isbn=978-81-7023-555-2|page=113}} The Committee prepared a well-argued report asking for Dominion Status for India. When the Viceregal announcement came granting Dominion Status as the ultimate goal for India, Sir Sankaran Nair retired from active politics. He died in 1934, aged 77.
Family
Sankaran Nair was married to his maternal cousin (uncle's daughter), Palat Kunhimalu Amma or Parvati Amma, at a young age according to the traditions of matrilineal lineage of Nayar aristocracy of the time. She predeceased him in 1926 during a pilgrimage to the holy temple of Badrinath in present-day Uttarakhand. The couple had six children.
- Their eldest daughter Parvathi Amma (later Lady Madhavan Nair) married her cousin Sir C. Madhavan Nair, a legal luminary and a judge of the Privy Council. They lived on a large estate known as Lynwood, in Chennai. Within this property, in the area now known as Lady Madhavan Nair colony/Mahalinagapuram, is situated near the Ayappan-Guruvayoorappan temple, the land for which was donated by Lady Madhavan Nair. There are still many roads bearing names of the house – Lynwood avenue – and of the children of Sir and Lady Nair – Palat Narayani Amma road, Palat Sankaran Nair road, Palat Madhavan Nair road.
- Saraswathy Amma, a.k.a. Anuji, the youngest daughter, was married to the eminent diplomat K. P. S. Menon. Their son, also called K.P.S. Menon, and grandson Shivshankar Menon were also diplomats who served as Foreign Secretary. Shivshankar Menon also served as India's 4th National Security Advisor.
- Their only son, R. M. Palat was also a noted politician in his own right.
- A daughter was married to M. A. Candeth. Their son, Lt. Gen. Kunhiraman Palat Candeth was the Western Army Commander during the Indo-Pak War of 1971 and the liberator of Goa.{{cite book|title=Autobiography of Sir C. Sankaran Nair|url=https://archive.org/details/autobiographyofs00sirc|year=1966|publisher=Lady Madhavan Nair}} Candeth's nephew and Sir Sankaran Nair's great-great-grandson, Anil Menon, is a NASA astronaut.{{Cite web |title=NASA's first Malayali astronaut has a word for ISRO's first Malayali astronaut |url=https://www.onmanorama.com/news/kerala/2024/03/07/nasa-isro-malayali-astronaut.html |access-date=2024-04-05 |website=Onmanorama}}
- Another daughter was married to M. Govindan Nair.
- Another daughter was married to T. K. Menon.
Sankaran Nair's grand-nephew, V. M. M. Nair, was the oldest surviving ICS Officer in India when he died in 2021.{{Cite web|url=https://www.whispersinthecorridors.com/detail/38747-V-M-M-Nair,-India%E2%80%99s-oldest-ICS-officer%E2%80%99s-100th-birthday-on-Oct-8|title=V M M Nair, India's oldest ICS officer's 100th birthday on Oct 8 {{!}}{{!}} Whispersinthecorridors|website=www.whispersinthecorridors.com|access-date=6 December 2019}} His grand-nephew (niece Ammukutty Amma's son) was K. K. Chettur, an ICS officer who also served as India's first ambassador to Japan. He was the father of Jaya Jaitly, a politician and socialist, whose husband Ashok Jaitly was chief secretary of Jammu and Kashmir. Jaya's daughter Aditi is married to the former cricketer Ajay Jadeja.
Another grand-nephew of Sankaran Nair's was P. P. Narayanan (son of Chettur Narayanan Nair), a distinguished world trade unionist and leader in Malaysia (Morais 1984, introductory pages).{{Cite book|last=Morais|first=John Victor 1910-|url=http://103.5.180.193/kip/Record/uum.b10025157|title=P.P. Narayanan a world trade unionist : a biography|date=1985|publisher=Unik Printguide}}
Popular Culture
A movie involving Sankaran Nair was officially announced in January 2025 by Dharma Productions and began production in December 2023, starring Akshay Kumar as Sir Sankaran Nair, and other cast members include R. Madhavan as McKinney and Ananya Panday as Dilreet Gill. The film titled as Kesari Chapter 2, was released on 18 April 2025 to positive reviews.{{cite web | url=https://www.pinkvilla.com/entertainment/news/kesari-chapter-2-5-things-to-know-about-c-sankaran-nair-and-what-followed-after-jallianwala-bagh-massacre-ahead-of-akshay-kumar-ananya-panday-r-madhavans-film-1383145 | title=Kesari Chapter 2: 5 things to know about C. Sankaran Nair and what followed after Jallianwala Bagh massacre ahead of Akshay Kumar, Ananya Panday, R Madhavan's film | date=18 April 2025 }}{{cite web | url=https://www.timesnownews.com/entertainment-news/box-office/kesari-chapter-2-advance-booking-akshay-kumars-c-sankaran-nair-biopic-sells-over-24k-tickets-aims-decent-opening-article-151439788 | title=Kesari Chapter 2 Advance Booking: Akshay Kumar's C Sankaran Nair Biopic Sells over 24K Tickets, Aims Decent Opening | date=17 April 2025 }} The film was also based on the events of Jallianwala Bagh Massacre.
References
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Bibliography
- [https://archive.org/details/gandhianarchy00sankuoft Gandhi and Anarchy (1922)]. Archive.org. Retrieved on 2012-06-11.
{{Indian National Congress Presidents}}
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{{DEFAULTSORT:Nair, C. Sankaran}}
Category:Presidents of the Indian National Congress
Category:Companions of the Order of the Indian Empire
Category:Indian Knights Bachelor
Category:Presidency College, Chennai alumni
Category:Advocates general for Tamil Nadu
Category:Members of the Imperial Legislative Council of India
Category:Members of the Madras Legislative Council
Category:Members of the Council of the Governor General of India