The Rajamundri Social Reform Association to encourage widow re-marriage was founded in 1871 by -

Correct — option (1), Veeresalingam.

The Rajahmundry (Rajamundri) Social Reform Association was founded by Kandukuri Veeresalingam Pantulu (1848–1919) of Rajahmundry, in the Telugu country of the Madras Presidency.

Charles H. Heimsath's Indian Nationalism and Hindu Social Reform (1964) calls him the "Vidyasagar of South India" and says he "founded the Rajahmundry Social Reform Association in 1878 and began his crusade against enforced widowhood".

The year differs from the stem. Heimsath gives 1878, not 1871. R. Suntharalingam's Politics and Nationalist Awakening in South India, 1852–1891 agrees: Veeresalingam started a Telugu weekly in 1874, and "Four years later" he and his associates organized the association.

The year 1871 does appear in S. Natarajan's A Century of Social Reform in India (1959), but for a different body: in Madras "a widow remarriage association had been started in 1871", later revived by Dewan Bahadur Raghunatha Rau.

On either date the founder of the Rajahmundry body is the same. Heimsath adds that Veeresalingam later founded a Widow Marriage Association in 1891 and a Widows' Home at Rajahmundry.

Rajahmundry Social Reform Association — Veeresalingam.

Why the others are wrong

• (2)
  K. Ramakrishan Pillai — K. Ramakrishna Pillai (1878–1916) was born after 1871, so he cannot have founded an association in that year.

  He was a Malayalam journalist from Travancore, known as editor of Swadeshabhimani. The newspaper was confiscated after he criticised the Diwan and the Maharaja, and he was exiled from Travancore in 1910.

• (3)
  K. T. Telang — Kashinath Trimbak Telang (1850–1893) worked in Bombay, not in the Telugu country. Heimsath places him with Ranade, Bhandarkar and Chandavarkar in the mainstream social reform movement of Bombay.

  He was a judge of the Bombay High Court and, with Pherozeshah Mehta and Badruddin Tyabji, a founder of the Bombay Presidency Association.

• (4)
  Gopalachariar — The sources on the Rajahmundry association used here, Heimsath (1964) and Suntharalingam, name Veeresalingam as its founder, not Gopalachariar.

  Natarajan links the Madras widow remarriage association of 1871 with a later revival by Dewan Bahadur Raghunatha Rau, not with this name either.

Widow remarriage became, in Heimsath's words, "the first social reform cause to be taken up throughout the country". He traces it from western India to Ahmedabad, to the Madras Presidency through Veeresalingam, and to northern India through Dayananda Saraswati and the Arya Samaj.

Veeresalingam wrote in Telugu and worked from Rajahmundry. His Telugu novel Rajasekhara Charitramu was serialised from 1878 and published as a book in 1880.

Heimsath adds that Veeresalingam later took his work for widows to Madras city, where he set up another Widows' Home that was handed over to the Hindu Social Reform Association in 1902.

Key facts

• Kandukuri Veeresalingam Pantulu (1848–1919) of Rajahmundry founded the Rajahmundry Social Reform Association; Heimsath (1964) dates it to 1878.
• Heimsath calls Veeresalingam the "Vidyasagar of South India".
• Natarajan (1959): a widow remarriage association was started in Madras in 1871 and revived in the 1880s by Dewan Bahadur Raghunatha Rau.
• Heimsath: Veeresalingam founded a Widow Marriage Association in 1891 and a Widows' Home at Rajahmundry.
• K. T. Telang (1850–1893) was a Bombay High Court judge and a founder of the Bombay Presidency Association.

Common traps

• The stem's year, 1871, differs from Heimsath's 1878 for the Rajahmundry association; Natarajan's 1871 is for a widow remarriage association in Madras.
• A reformer's life dates can rule an option out: K. Ramakrishna Pillai was born in 1878.
• Telang was a social reformer too, but in Bombay; the place in the association's name points to the Telugu region.

UnlockIAS will link similar questions from RAS Pre 2018 here once that paper is published on this site.

• practice — not a real PYQ

  Which social reformer has been called the "Vidyasagar of South India" ?

  • (a)Kandukuri Veeresalingam
  • (b)K. T. Telang
  • (c)M. G. Ranade
  • (d)Raghunatha Rau
  Answer(1) — Heimsath (1964) calls Veeresalingam Pantulu the "Vidyasagar of South India" for his work for widow remarriage. Option (2), Telang, and option (3), Ranade, were Bombay reformers; option (4), Raghunatha Rau, revived a Madras widow remarriage association in the 1880s, according to Natarajan (1959).
• practice — not a real PYQ

  The Telugu novel Rajasekhara Charitramu (1880) was written by

  • (a)K. Ramakrishna Pillai
  • (b)Kandukuri Veeresalingam
  • (c)K. T. Telang
  • (d)R. Venkata Ratnam Naidu
  Answer(2) — Veeresalingam published Rajasekhara Charitramu in 1880. Option (1), K. Ramakrishna Pillai, wrote in Malayalam; option (3), K. T. Telang, was a Bombay judge and Sanskrit scholar; option (4), R. Venkata Ratnam Naidu, was a Madras reformer who worked at Cocanada and Masulipatam.