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Padmavathy is a 21-year-old working with the IT industry. She hails from a small town near Madurai and migrated to the city for employment. On the morning of January 19, she begged off from work, and with a group of her colleagues, headed off to Marina beach, the iconic seashore of Chennai.

She had heard that the motley protest seeking to reclaim Tamil Nadu's most popular rural sport, Jallikattu, had now escalated into a larger, heavily-charged movement and she wanted to be a part of it.

Why do you support Jallikattu? I asked her. With extraordinary clarity, she said that Pongal is the one festival, and Jallikattu, the one sport played during the festival, that took her back to her roots once a year. For the rest of the year, she was away from home, working as a migrant, in a culturally disconnected industry - IT.

"But don't misunderstand, I enjoy my job," she hastily added. "Isn't it a sport about machismo that hurts the bull?" I asked. Throwing political correctness to the wind, she said, "I don't have a problem with females in short skirts and I don't have a problem with this guy-sport once a year." Moreover, she said, the rules of the game do not intend for the bull to be hurt. She didn't stop there. She went on to comment about the status of farmers, the insidiousness of multinationals and the destructive agendas of politicians. Even as she was entertaining my persistent line of inquiry, she nudged a man not to litter the beach and handed out bottles of water to fellow protestors. It was hard to comprehend this energy, but also hard to believe that this young lady would want to hurt any creature at all.

Perhaps this is the essence of the epic Marina mega-mobilisation of January 2017 that mainstream discourse has not been able to wrap its head around. The mainstream national media, which rarely features even the farmer and the agricultural sector in its prime time, struggled to get a fix on the pronunciation of this common sport that it was alien to, calling it jelly-cut, Jolly-cut, Jaalikaatoo and their variations.

"History tells us that cultural symbols have been the most powerful catalysts of mass mobilisations," says professor M. D. Muthukumaraswamy, the director of National Folklore Support Centre. "But an inflexion point such as this cannot happen because of one sport. It is the accumulated frustration and suppressed aspirations of the people that have come home to roost".

The professor, who has spent decades researching folklore in the interiors of Tamil Nadu, added that "You cannot do socio-cultural engineering through centralised lawmaking. Systemic change can only be effected through sustained engagement with grassroots communities."

In order to make sense of this phenomenon now christened as the Tamil makkal movement (Tamil people's movement), let's rewind to December 2015. Chennai witnessed the worst floods in nearly a hundred years. As the water rose, Chennai began to panic at the state's inaction to salvage the city. As the city looked like it was about to sink, communication channels broke down between the government and its people.

The rest of the country, including the national media, pretended that Tamil Nadu did not exist. Overnight, Chennaiites walked, waded and swam into their streets to be there for each other and it turned into one of the most historic events of self-propelled human resource mobilisation, and it didn't stop there.

For the first time in the era of the two mass leaders - Karunanidhi and Jayalalithaa - the people openly criticised their government without fear. So much so that out of fear of becoming irrelevant to her people, the then chief minister issued a public apology pleading for forgiveness. More importantly, murmurs about the state's inaction on several other issues ailing Tamil Nadu also began to resonate. The people of Tamil Nadu unanimously agreed that the floods were largely caused by the anti-environmental model of 'development'. Since this awakening, a time bomb has been waiting to be triggered.

Sure enough, a year later, the bomb exploded. In the state's biggest harvest festival Pongal, when Jallikattu is the primary festival sport, a sullen rural Tamil Nadu went sport-less for the most part. But a few who defied its judicial ban set off a state-people confrontation, and the rest became history on Marina beach.

A few tens of students who congregated on the beach on January 16 became a few hundreds the next day and a few thousands the next. By January 18, the Jallikattu protest had seized the imagination of every child, adult and the elderly. Farmers, corporate professionals, students educationists, all were at the Marina.

The immediate cry of the Tamil makkal movement was to reclaim its rural sport, Jallikattu. The new national divide was the pro-Jallikattu groups who were pretty much a majority of the Tamils across the world and the anti-animal cruelty constituency, which was the rest of India.

Some Tamils try to reconcile these two positions by pledging that "Pro-Jallikattu is not anti-animal and anti-Jallikattu are not anti-Tamil". The complexity of the discourse will be unpacked in the future. Jallikattu as the symbol of the protest will continue to be problematised and contested and will have to be reinvented to flourish as a compassionate rural sport. But it may be difficult to do away with it in a context where disenfranchisement is already having a ripple effect on the collective psyche of rural India.

More importantly, other issues have also begun to receive attention. The Tamil Nadu drought crisis, the Cauvery water issue, the fisherman's issues and corporate invasion were among those flagged at the four-day uprising. Videos of protesters breaking and throwing cola bottles and asking people to boycott these multinationals went viral on social media. Banners condemning the neglect of farmers were held high. The cathartic energy also saw some unsavoury sloganeering, but that was overwhelmed by the creativity and poetry of the Tamizh imagination.

But what will also be debated for a long time to come is the uprising itself and its road to victory. The context of the protest for 'Tamizh pride' is compelling. Under the current dispensation at the centre, a very specific idea of 'nationalism' has taken centre-stage. The new normal has become the 'nationalist' versus the 'anti-nationalist' and the soldier has been the most used symbol to raise the pitch of this nationalism.

Much of this government-driven atmospheric has alienated the states and communities that are remote from it. Perhaps the Marina protest was a manifestation of a sub-nationalism that feels more connected to its own ethos and identification with a cultural symbol that is among the last of its surviving rural recreational activities. And with the increasing resentment towards top-down governance and corporate and multinational occupations, the international NGO, PETA, one of the petitioners of the judicial ban of Jallikattu, became the target of this collective frustration because it was perceived as a 'foreign-hand', top-down agency, that did much of its PR through celebrity co-option.

Undoubtedly, the 'Tamil makkal movement' at least in its four-day agitation, completely changed the terms of engagement and broke all forms of stereotypes. The stars of the protest were not the film celebrities, who conducted a silent protest away from the media glare. Nor the politicians who were actually turned away when they attempted to extract political mileage. But it was charismatic grassroots intellectuals who began to emerge from the shadows and take the floor. Siva Senapathy of theSenaapathy Kangayam Cattle Research Foundation, who made an impassioned speech about the state of farmers and issues of agriculture.

The very articulate Tamil writer and intellectual, Balakumar Somu, held forth with the national media, educating them on the Marina phenomenon. Committed environmental activist, Nityanand Jayaraman, discussed the complexities of Jallikattu itself and scores of other young and well-informed intellectuals took the spirit of the protest to the rest of the world with dignity and eloquence. The orderliness of the over-twenty-thousand strong protestors was so surreal that even the Chennai police ended up enabling, rather than controlling, the protest gathering. Volunteers supplied water, food and refreshments, folk artists sang, danced, rolled their drums and the protest spontaneously and organically turned into an evocative carnival. For the first time in post-independent India, a self-propelled mass protest happened quite literally, for, by and of the people. It was about fulfilling the aspirations of the people, not about opposing the 'other'. It was about restoring self-esteem of the Tamils, not about degrading the 'other'.

The Marina protest was, in fact, a reflection of the people's assertion to eliminate the agencies of their own voices, to speak for themselves, and to reclaim the commons from all forms of vested interests.

Will the Marina mobilisation lead to a more sustainable initiative for a greater social change? Will it proceed to address the very issues that resonated at the protest, beyond the reclamation of Jallikattu, to the reclamation of their environment, water, soil and livelihoods? Thai Pirandal Vazhi Pirakkum (opportunities are born with the Tamil Calendar month of Thai ) goes the famous Tamil adage. The month of Thai started on January 15. Will the v azhi, opportunity, be seized? Will the collective consciousness of the Tamil makkal movement be a game-changer in the long run?

Time, that tantaliser, will hopefully surprise us again.
Sharada Ramanathan is a film director.

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More than Reclaiming a Rural Sport, the Jallikattu Protest is Symbol of Tamil Self-Assertion

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Padmavathy is a 21-year-old working with the IT industry. She hails from a small town near Madurai and migrated to the city for employment. On the morning of January 19, she begged off from work, and with a group of her colleagues, headed off to Marina beach, the iconic seashore of Chennai.

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ஏறு தழுவல், மஞ்சு விரட்டு அல்லது சல்லிக்கட்டு (ஜல்லிக்கட்டு) என்பது தமிழர்களின் மரபுவழி விளையாட்டுகளில் ஒன்றாகும். ஏறு என்பது காளை மாட்டைக் குறிக்கும். மாட்டை ஓடவிட்டு அதை மனிதர்கள் அடக்குவது, அல்லது கொம்பைப் பிடித்து வீழ்த்துவதான விளையாட்டு.தமிழர்களின் வீர விளையாட்டுகளில் ஒன்றாகக் கருதப்படுவது  இவ்விளையாட்டு

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புதுக்கோட்டை மாவட்டம் ஐல்லிக்கட்டின் "சொர்க்க பூமியாக " இன்னும் திகழ்ந்து வருகிறது.

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ஊர்களில் ஆண்டுதோறும் தை மாதத்தில் பொங்கல் திருநாளையொட்டி நடத்தப் பெறுகின்றன.

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பிற பெயர்கள் சல்லிக்கட்டு, மஞ்சு விரட்டு

முதலில் விளையாடியது கி.மு. 2000

விளையாட்டைப் பற்றிய குறிப்புகள்
இருபாலரும் இல்லை
பகுப்பு/வகை பாரம்பரிய விளையாட்டு

விளையாடுமிடம் திறந்த மைதானம்

தற்போதைய நிலை
தாயகம் தமிழ்நாடு, இந்தியா

ஒலிம்பிக் இல்லை
இணை ஒலிம்பிக் இல்லை

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வேலி ஜல்லிக்கட்டு:
வேலி மஞ்சுவிரட்டு எனப்படும் விளையாட்டில் ஒரு திடலில் காளைகள் அவிழ்த்துவிடப்படுகின்றன. அவை எந்தக் கட்டுப்பாடும் இல்லாமல் ஓடுவதும் அவற்றை இளைஞர்கள் விரட்டுவதும் நடைபெறுகிறது.

வாடிவாசல் ஜல்லிக்கட்டு:
மதுரை அலங்காநல்லூர் போன்ற இடங்களில் வாடிவாசல் வழியாக வெளியேறும் காளைகளை இளைஞர்கள் விரட்டிச் சென்று அதன் திமில் மீது தொங்கியபடி குறிப்பிட்ட தூரம் செல்கிறார்கள்.

வடம் ஜல்லிக்கட்டு:
வட தமிழகத்தில் வடம் மஞ்சுவிரட்டு என்ற பெயரில், 20 அடி நீளக் கயிற்றால் காளையைக் கட்டி, இருபுறமும் காளையை ஆண்கள் இழுத்துப் பிடிக்க, ஒரு சிலர் மட்டும் அதன் முன்னே நின்று கொம்பில் உள்ள பரிசுப் பணத்தை எடுக்க முயல்கிறார்கள்

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Boats and boating--Equipment and supplies

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எசுப்பானியா, போர்ச்சுகல், மெக்சிகோ நாடுகளில் காளைப் போர் முக்கியமான தேசியப் பொழுதுபோக்கு விளையாட்டாக இன்றும் நடைபெறுகிறது. காளைகளை அரங்கத்திற்குள் விரட்டி, ஆத்திரமூட்டிச் சண்டையிட்டுக் கொல்வதே இக்காளைப் போரின் நோக்கம். இம்மேனாட்டுக் காளைப் போரும் சல்லிக்கட்டும் ஒன்று போலத் தோன்றினாலும், இரண்டும் முற்றிலும் வேறுபட்டவை ஆகும்.

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பெயர்க்காரணம்

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பெயர்க்காரணம்

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சல்லி என்பது விழாவின் போது மாட்டின் கழுத்தில் கட்டப்படுகிற வளையத்தினைக் குறிக்கும். புளியங் கம்பினால் வளையம் செய்து காளையின் கழுத்தில் அணியும் வழக்கம் தற்போதும் வழக்கத்தில் உள்ளது. அதோடு, 50 ஆண்டுகளுக்கு முன்பு புழக்கத்தில் இருந்த 'சல்லிக் காசு' என்னும் இந்திய நாணயங்களைத் துணியில் வைத்து மாட்டின் கொம்புகளில் கட்டிவிடும் பழக்கம் இருந்தது. மாட்டை அணையும் வீரருக்கு அந்தப் பணமுடிப்பு சொந்தமாகும். இந்தப் பழக்கம் பிற்காலத்தில் 'சல்லிக்கட்டு' என்று மாறியது. பேச்சுவழக்கில் அது திரிந்து 'ஜல்லிக்கட்டு' ஆனது என்றும் கூறப்படுகிறது.

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