Writer, journalist, political analyst and Tamil theatre personality Gnani Sankaran died on Monday morning due to a stroke. He passed away while being taken to a hospital from his K.K. Nagar residency in Chennai. He was suffering from a kidney ailment and was undergoing dialysis for the same.
Sankaran was the editor of a Tamil magazine called Dheemtharikida and had written several plays, books and for television. He was also a regular columnist for various English and Tamil publications.
Known to be a firebrand journalist, he criticised politics and social evils. Even the media was not exempt from his ire. On the issue of a 24-year-old Infosys employee being hacked to death, he raised serious questions, pushing newspapers to pursue greater depth. He said, "Media and cinema also have a role to play. Most of the time, they project the idea that men are born only to enjoy women, and women are created to serve men. And if he doesn’t get her, then she cannot be available to anybody else."
His contribution to Tamil theatre was unparalleled. He was one of the founder members of the Koothu-p-pattarai Trust in 1976. He once recalled saying, “it was then a movement to revive Koothu, the traditional Tamil theatre form, and to evolve a modern idiom from these roots,” he was reported saying. Koothu-p-pattarai is a prominent Tamil theatre group that has organised plays for 31 years based in Chennai.
Media associations, journalists, social activists, politicians have condoled the death of Gnani, whose body, as per his wish, will be donated to a medical college hospital.
