- Pattom A. Thanu Pillai
Pattom A. Thanu Pillai (b.
Thiruvananthapuram onJuly 15 ,1885 - d.July 27 ,1970 ) was a participant in theIndian independence movement who later served as the Chief Minister ofKerala fromFebruary 22 ,1960 toSeptember 25 ,1962 .He was born to Varadayyar and Eswari Amma. He worked as a teacher.Fact|date=February 2007 He earned a degree in
law and started practising as a lawyer, but soon became an active participant in the struggle for independence and joined theIndian National Congress , becoming leader of Congress in the erstwhile princely state ofTravancore .His actual name was A. Thanu Pillai. Since he came from Pattom in Thiruvananthapuram, he was called Pattom Thanu Pillai. Popularly he was known as just "Pattom".
The struggle for a responsible government in the princely state culminated in the ousting of the Diwan,
Sir C.P. Ramaswami Iyer . Sir C.P. left Travancore on August 19, 1947. After Indian Independence and before the formation of Kerala state in 1956, he became Prime Minister ofTravancore fromMarch 24 ,1948 toOctober 22 ,1948 . After independence, the princely states of Travancore andCochin were amalgamated to formTravancore-Cochin State onJuly 1 ,1949 .As a PSP member Pillai became Chief Minister of
Thiru-Kochi (or Travancore-Cochin) fromMarch 16 ,1954 toFebruary 14 ,1955 . The State ofKerala was formed onNovember 1 , 1956 and the first state elections held there in March 1957 and resulted in a Communist Party-led administration. Pillai was an MLA for Thiruvananthapuram II representing the PSP.When the first Kerala administration fell in the onslaught of "Vimochana Samaram" (Liberation Struggle) against the Communist rule and after elections in 1960 Pillai became the second Chief Minister of Kerala as head of a coalition administration. He was in power from
February 22 ,1960 toSeptember 26 ,1962 . In 1962, he became the Governor of Punjab. Later he was appointed the Governor ofAndhra Pradesh in which role he served fromMay 4 , 1964 untilApril 11 , 1968.External links
* [http://www.keralacm.gov.in/pattam.html Profile at keralacm.gov.in]
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