Twin blows to Tamil Nadu

Tamil Nadu lost its most charismatic CM J.Jayalalithaa yesterday .Today TN has lost another eminent personality Cho Ramasamy. The multi faceted lawyer turned actor and   journalist breathed last in Apollo hospital, Chennai today. Ironically Jayalalithaa visited Cho when he was admitted in Apollo Hospitals in August 2015 and said to him "Don't worry .You will be alright. Doctors are optimistic. Think Positively."  Yesterday while watching Jaylalithaa's funeral in TV, seeing a host of celebrities, it suddenly occurred to me the conspicuous absence of Cho a staunch supporter of Jayalalithaa. I immediately thought, had he been in good health he would have visited and said to myself Jaya consoled Cho an year back, now she is no more. At that time I didn't know Cho was again admitted to Apollo Hospitals and in fact was at Apollo Hospital yesterday.

Cho was the founder editor of the political satire magazine 'Thughlak' ,one of its kind in Tamil.. He was popular for his unbiased outspoken and forthright political views. He served as a nominated Rajya Sabha MP for one term during Vajpaye's period. He was an accomplished playwright and theater artist also. Nominated MP's also get government's MPLAD funds every year .Many of the nominated MP's  did not use their funds for any welfare activities at that time .But Cho used the funds properly and gave accounts of how the funds were spent in his weekly Thuglak .

During the emergency period in 1975, he humorously defied the press censorship and rose to all India popularity. I still remember how Frank Moraes the late editor of Indian Express wrote in his front page editorial about Cho during the emergency period. He said " here is a bright young spark from Tamil Nadu". During emergency he printed an issue with a black cover and went off press.  An intelligent Cho knew how to bye pass the government censorship . In the movie review section, he wrote a review for an old Tamil movie  'Sarvathikari' (Dictator) .  In the literary section he used Bharathiyar's verse from Panchali Sapatham " கட்டுண்டோம், பொறுத்திருப்போம்,காலம் மாறும்.(We are bound now .Let us wait. Times will Change). Finally Thuglak was stopped during emergency. Then he started an English version called Pickwick .But it  was not as popular as Thuglak .Eventually Pickwick was shut down and Thuglak was restarted. The Shah commission appointed by the government to inquire to emergency excesses inquired the harassment faced by Thuglak also. But much before emergency, in 1960, the Bakthavatsalam government in TN wanted to censor the script of his play "Sambavami yuge yuge".  His drama "Mohamed bin Thuglak" was a satire on floor crossing,a malady that  shook Indian politics at that time. When this drama was made in to a film, DMK tried to stop its production,but failed to do so. Then they tried to prevent its screening .

He has also authored many books . He was an unorthodox satirist. He once wrote "If the Left has a future in India ,then India has no future left." When union congress government released a postal stamp to honour Sanjay Gandhi posthumously, Cho released a postal stamp of  Captain Saxena who also died in the same air crash. He would be remembered for long as a non conformist journalist.