IN MEMORY OF KUNDARA VILAMBARAM

IN MEMORY OF

 KUNDARA VILAMBARAM

The Veluthampi Dalava Smaraka Kendram celebrated the 203rd anniversary of ‘Kundara Vilambaram,' through which Veluthampi Dalava exhorted the public to fight colonialism, by offering floral tributes to the statue of the Dalava in front of the Secretariat on Sunday15th January,2012..Historian T.P. Sankarankutty Nair said the State government must set up a memorial for Veluthampi Dalava in the city. “During the 200 birth anniversary celebrations of the Dalava the then Chief Minister R. Shankar had announced that a befitting memorial would be constructed for him in the city. Oommen Chandy should now fulfil Shankar's promise,” Mr. Nair said.

Elampallur was the location from where Velu Thampi Dalawa made the declaration 187 years ago to fight and chase away the British and liberate Travancore. That declaration came to be known as the Kundara Vilambaram. A memorial for the Kundara Vilambaram has been promised by successive Governments. In stages, a structure started coming up at Elampallur but it remained incomplete. The structure was not built with any fund allocation from the Government. Though considered a part of Kundara, Elampallur is today under the Eravipuram Assembly Constituency. Mr. Baby got elected to the Assembly from the Kundara Constituency. Thus when the Cultural Department announced the laying of a foundation stone for the Velu Thampi Dalawa Cultural Complex at Nanthrikkal, which comes under the Kundara Constituency, it stirred a hornet's nest.  Votaries of the Vilambara Memorial camp at Elampallur cried foul. They alleged that the Nanthrikkal complex is coming up at the cost of the Vilambaram Memorial. They even went to extent of alleging that Mr. Baby had vested interests in constructing the cultural complex in memory of Velu Thampi at Nanthrikkal and that with the complex coming up at Nanthrikkal, the memorial at Elampallur will never be realised. The campaign clicked and it triggered statements and speeches from various sections condemning the "Government move to shift the location of the memorial for Velu Thampi Dalawa." The issue even got politicised. While the one at Nanthrikkal would be a cultural complex in Dalawa's memory, the one at Elampallur would be the Vilambaram Memorial. The former would function as a museum.
                                                                 Prof. John Kurakar