The champion of the washermen community in Tamil Nadu is no more

Robancy A Helen, India

Father Arul Valan, a Salesian priest of Don Bosco, champion of the poor and oppressed, especially an advocate for the rights of the Thurumbar (Puthirai Vannars), the washermen community in Tamil, just died of a heart attack on April 8, 2025, at 2:30 am.

He was preparing for the arrival of the Tamil Nadu government officials from Chennai to distribute lands to more than 90 Thurumbar families near Kallakruchi.

He complained of acute chest pain while he was staying near Kallakurichi and was taken to the government Hospital, Sankarapuram

Father Valan was born on May 31, 1970, and made his first profession at the Congregation of Don Bosco on June 11, 1988. On September 2, 2000, he received his ordination. He belongs to the Salesian province of Chennai, Tamil Nadu, India.

Father Valan began the Thurumbar Liberation Movement in 2003 and strived to restore human dignity and rights to the most oppressed Puthirai Vannar (Thurumbar) community of Tamil Nadu.

For more than two decades, Father Valan has been working for the rights of the most marginalized Dalit community. Puthirai Vannars are the last and the least in the caste-based hierarchical Tamil society.

“I am excited to share his mission and journey along with Sister Alphonsa all these years. My heartfelt condolences to Sister Alphonsa and her Thurumbar communities. May his soul rest in peace,” says Father Benjamin Chinnappan, founder of the Dalit Solidarity Network.

Fr. Valan is the co-founder of the Thurumbar Liberation Movement Tamil Nadu along with Sr. Alphonsa. Thurumbar denotes the washermen who wash the clothes of the Dalits, the so-called untouchables. Because they were cleaning the clothes of the untouchable Dalits, they were previously viewed as unseemly.

Fr. Valan, along with Sr. Alphonsa, founded the Thurumbar Liberation Movement and recognized them as fellow human beings. They were the voice of these voiceless people.

They conducted door-to-door visits to religious houses to educate the children of these washermen. Though Fr. Valan was a heart patient, he was traveling day and night, visiting the people sleeping in their places and telling them about their human dignity and rights.

“It is a tremendous loss not only for the washermen people but for all the people who work for the development of the marginalized, bemoans Father Devasagayaraj M. Zackarias, former executive secretary of the Catholic Bishops’ Conference of India, Office for Scheduled Castes and Backward Classes.

The movement emerged as a response to the atrocities and untouchability perpetrated on the Puthirai Vannar community, which spread through Tiruvannamalai and Villupuram districts.

In 2003, caste-bonded labor rescued three Puthirai Vannar families from Kuruvimalai village in Tiruvannamalai district. The Catholic parish in Sathiamangalam village, Villupuram district, actively discriminated against the Puthirai Vannar families. These incidents snowballed into the formation of many sangams (associations), which later emerged as the Thurumbar Liberation Movement (TLM).

A Sangam consists of 15 to 20 villages. They hold monthly meetings to solve their problems. Trainings are held for the members—women and children in particular. Children receive education scholarships. It is active in Villupuram, Cuddalore, Tiruvannamalai, Vellore, and Kancheepuram in Tamil Nadu.

Father Arul Valan was a powerful fighter who created a dawn in the life of the Thurumbers, who are politically, economically, and socially marginalized in society. His passing away is a shock for all of us.

“We cannot summarize his activities and struggle movements in a few lines. He never hesitates to invite leftists to the protests in the Villupuram district, which support the Washermen community in Tamil Nadu. I have engaged in ideological discussions with him over the course of several days,” said Zackarias.

Those days were useful, and it was a great lesson for me. Even though he left us, his history will be cherished by the generations of oppressed people living in the slum, says Savarirajan Arockiam, a member of the Communist Party of India in Villupuram.

Before taking the Thurumber ministry in 2004, Father Valan was an assistant parish priest in Saint Anthony’s Church, Veeralur, and Sacred Heart Church, Polur, of the Vellore diocese, Tamil Nadu, and was the director of VIA.

His entire life as a priest and a member of the Don Bosco congregation, he dedicated his life and mission to the liberation of the washermen people in Tamil Nadu.

It is a great loss for the Christian Thurumber people in Tamil Nadu, who are among the Dalits.

His funeral will be held on April 9, 2025, at Dominic Savio, Tirupattur.