Vairamuthu, the Jnanpith, and the question of merit

The choice of Vairamuthu for the Jnanpith Award 2025 has provoked a fierce debate within the Tamil literary community. The controversy revolves around four main arguments.

The loudest of these arguments is that Vairamuthu is a lyricist rather than a litterateur. The Jnanpith guidelines explicitly state that the award is for outstanding literary contributions that illuminate human values rooted in Indian philosophy, present a broad vision, and contribute new perspectives to the Indian literary canon.

Does Vairamuthu’s oeuvre meet this demand? A vast body of his works consists of film songs (over 7500) which were written to suit a specific scene, melody, or commercial demand; while they can be “literature-adjacent,” they cannot be part of a literary canon. What is more, his film songs, his critics argue, often objectify the female body, crossing from the sensual into the vulgar. Whether objectification takes away literary merit is a long-standing debate in criticism, but the fact remains that, in Vairamuthu’s songs, the objectification is often gratuitous rather than a thematic choice adding depth, and this diminishes the artistic value of the songs.

Neither does the substantial body of work Vairamuthu has produced outside cinema – novels such as Kallikaattu Ithihasam, which won the Sahitya Akademi award in 2003, and Karuvachi Kaviyam in which he treats agrarian crises – matches the high standards required for the Jnanpith Award.  As Jeyamohan rightly points out, Vairamuth’s “rural aesthetic” consists of lyrical melodrama–a cinematic mode to amplify the sentimental value of a crisis–that relies on rhetorical flourishes. In the process of this “poetic” elevation or romanticization, the village emerges as a stage for a great tragedy rather than as a living, breathing entity, as it does in the works of Poomani and Ki Ra, who are authentic chroniclers of the soil.

Secondly, the Jnanpith is no longer given for a specific outstanding literary work of an author; the entire body of work produced by them is taken into account. Vairamuthu’s work fails on this count, too, as his primary body of work consists of film songs composed for commercial purposes and pandering to commercial tastes. In fact, Vairamuthu’s fame is firmly rooted in film lyrics.

Thirdly, Jeyamohan’s language may be unrestrained (e.g. Vairamuthu is “not a poet at all” but merely a “ridiculous film lyricist”), but his argument that Vairamuthu’s work does not represent the depth of contemporary Tamil literature is valid. In selecting him for the award, the Pravara Parishad has unwittingly created a wrong impression about the Tamil literary landscape, as it did in 1975 when Akilan was selected for this award for his Chithira Pavai (a novel that represented pulp fiction with a shallow story-telling device), largely thanks to the widespread popularity it had gained during its run in Kalki magazine.

The fourth argument rests on moral grounds. Carnatic musician TM Krishna and playback singer Chinmayi Sripaada have questioned how an institution representing national cultural authority can honour an individual accused of harassment by multiple women. This shifts the focus to a broader question: Can a person’s artistic achievements be considered in isolation from their personal conduct when conferring a nation’s highest honours?

While a nomination is often influenced by popularity, the Jnanpith guidelines explicitly state that the award is for “creative literary writing” that fosters commitment to “higher values of life.” That is what makes the choice of Vairamuthu so controversial. His critics suggest that the committee’s judgement was swayed by his commercial success and political clout rather than literary standards.

 

From Hierarchy to Homogeny: The AI Takeover of Voices

“I read your message more than once before responding, as I felt it deserved that pause,” GRK’s email began. Was this truly from him? A quick check of the “From” field confirmed it was—GRK’s display name alongside the email address left no doubt.

Surprise was giving way to amusement. The tone was uncharacteristic of GRK. It carried several cultural risks in a hierarchical environment, and GRK, like many other Indians, was a quintessential product of such a culture.

I reread the line. My message “deserved that pause,” it said, as though evaluating my words. In high-power-distance cultures like the Indian social and professional environment, it is generally the superior’s role to evaluate the quality of communication, not the subordinate’s. GRK, being far below me on the professional ladder, was stepping out of line by positioning himself as a judge of my message. His implied equality was, in a sense, a break from the hierarchical culture he was raised in.

And then there was the over-familiarity of the line: “…I felt (it deserved that pause).” Professional communication in India typically remains formal and indirect. A subordinate telling his superior about his “feeling” in a certain way about the boss’s email can be seen as overstepping professional boundaries. GRK would never be one to cross those boundaries.

Next, the subordinate’s candid statement that he had to “pause” and “think” before responding. A subordinate, in a hierarchical professional environment, pausing and thinking about a superior’s message! Was he being critical of the superior’s email? Didn’t this at least suggest he was defensive?

In other words, GRK was evaluating my message which, though a positive transformation, would be perceived as presumptuous in Indian professional and social culture, where professional interactions are often dictated by rank rather than collaborative merit. If at all a subordinate shows their “deep thought,” it should be to demonstrate their diligence and respect for the superior’s expertise.

Why was GRK being so “impudently reflective” rather than respectfully thorough, as was his wont? The truth dawned on me: it wasn’t GRK speaking—it was an AI writing agent at the helm. The AI had used GRK’s prompts and delivered an email whose directness and over-familiar tone were beyond GRK’s understanding. In the pre-AI age, GRK would have written something like, “Sir, your email offered valuable insights…”

This is the case with the emails I receive from my colleagues nowadays: they are “voiceless.” In the past, their voices were distinct. GRK’s emails, for instance, were indirect and over-polite. But their characteristic quality was a huge gap between intention and expression, and the struggle was touching. PR’s emails were long-winded, and his overly formal apologies—a la Jane Austen's Mr Collins—always stood out. NB’s were lengthy, rambling, illogical, and extremely painful to read. LV was fond of obsequious vocabulary and hyperbolic praise, but his diction was distinctly different from NG’s unctuous language, which was greasy to the touch, as it were. The emails of all these colleagues shared some common qualities: they abounded in tense mixing, false inversion, double past, syntactical non sequiturs, overuse of the definite article, and weakening intensifiers, among others. But they had a touch of individuality: each email writer had a signature style that was distinct, consistent, and recognizable. You could “hear” each writer’s “voice,” and this lent a touch of authenticity to the emails.

I miss those voices now. All of them use generative AI, which “sanitizes” their overuse of “softeners” and indirectness, placing their ideas in a generic template with acceptable English. In the emails of the pre-AI age, the ideas and language were often laughable, but the writers spoke in their own voices. Even now, when they make oral presentations, I hear their voices. But when they write, they all sound uniform, indistinguishable, and intellectual. Even when they—the AI Writing Assistant, I mean—use the personal pronoun “I,” it sounds distant and impersonal.

“Here lies Nolly Goldsmith, for shortness called Noll / Who wrote like an angel and talked like poor Poll,” wrote David Garrick about Oliver Goldsmith (“Poll” was a common nickname for a parrot). While my colleagues continue to sound as they have always done when they speak, they now speak in borrowed voices when they write, sounding like Oxbridge or Ivy League scholars.

AI writing ill-fits them. Two descriptions from literary criticism come to mind. “Matthew Arnold in a sari,” remarked Gordon Bottomley, reacting to Victorian sentiment and style being awkwardly dressed in Indian themes in early Indian English poetry. “Shakuntala in skirts,” said an amused Gokak, who found the English translations of Indian poetry as stiffly Western.

The tapas of self-promotion

KIA practises the philosophy of self-adulation to perfection. But no doctrine of self-importance can survive without external validation, and that, in turn, requires captive audiences. KIA is fortunate on this count. Given his leadership position, he can always summon a meeting and be assured of an indulgent audience. He can also stop employees in corridors and buttonhole them about his greatness – stories often laced with epic adventures such as grabbing a quick bite well past lunchtime, heroically enduring the delay, and returning home late in the evening after a day-long quest for the “holy grail.” Preaching a me-first doctrine requires the self-assurance of a Don Quixote, the self-righteousness of a Malvolio, and the intelligence of Paramanandayya’s sishyulu. KIA possesses these qualities in generous measure.

 

“I couldn’t go home for lunch today,” KIA said to me when I met him yesterday.

 

I didn’t ask him why. I knew that a long tale about this great event lay in wait like an ambush, ready to spring. But the guns did not fire at once. There was a long reflective pause – something uncharacteristic of KIA. I dropped my defences and began to relax when he ruefully shook his head and said, “Yet another hectic day!”

 

“Oh really!” I said, almost involuntarily – and instantly regretted it. It was a foolish breach, enough for KIA to charge through with a familiar tale, narrated in vague but portentous terms, about how busy he had been.

 

His monotonous intoning was suddenly overlaid by a deep rumble as a Bandar-bound train approached the crossing, sounding two long blasts. The chugging slowly faded, and silence returned. KIA droned on, unmindful of the interruption. Somewhere a mobile phone rang. On the road behind us, a car screeched to a halt and a dog let out a series of howls. Someone cursed in Telugu. Nothing disturbed KIA. He was a picture of dedication. Lost in his self-promoting tapas, he was oblivious to all competing noises.

 

“So, I asked my wife to pack it and send it here, and she did so,” he concluded, a self-satisfied smile spreading across his face. Then, as though recalling an important detail, he added a rounding-off statement: “When I finished eating, it was quarter past two.”

 

My instincts urged caution; another boast was brewing. "Isn’t it time for the meeting?" I cut in. "It’s ten to three. Let’s go."

 

I stood and marched towards the door. If KIA was rattled by the abrupt exit, he didn’t show it. We had scarcely cleared the threshold, however, when he launched into a new saga of self-importance.

 

"I have completed thirty-two NPTEL courses," he said, craning his neck to force eye contact.

 

I ignored the expectant look and walked on. This line of defence proved no better than the first. The NPTEL narrative continued but did not conclude; it had interwoven storylines and a non-linear progression. KIA promised to tell me the rest after the scheduled event.

 

KIA started the meeting. His speech was concise and respectful of the audience’s time. He retold the NPTEL story just once, taking no more than five minutes, and made only a passing reference to his delayed lunch, sparing the audience details such as the phone call to his wife and the meal arriving from home. Without much ado, he announced me as the guest speaker, invited me to speak, and stepped down.

 

When I finished, he was back on the podium—and, sure enough, back on that familiar NPTEL-refrain. Time was now available in plenty; the scheduled event was over. It now dawned on me that my guest lecture had merely been a pretext. Self-promotion, I realised, was the de facto agenda.

 

Let me end this vignette on a reflective note. How do vainglorious bores rise to positions in which leadership skills ostensibly matter?

 

The question is best answered anecdotally rather than in black-and-white terms. In the television series, Maharani, streaming on SonyLIV, Gauri Shankar Pandey—a degenerate politician as adept at bootlicking as he is at bullying—is reincarnated as the Governor of Bihar after successfully engineering a series of diabolical intrigues.

 

In the final scene of Season 4, he makes a dramatic entrance at the Raj Bhavan in a chauffeured black Mercedes-Benz. Equally at ease in a Bandhgala suit as he once was in a haphazardly wrapped dhoti, he saunters in, seats himself majestically in an ornate push-back chair, and casts a supercilious glance at Navin Kumar, Prem Kumar Chaubey’s confidant, before curtly rejecting his plea for Chaubey’s release.

 

“You will meet the fate of Bhima Bharti,” a furious Navin Kumar warns him. Pandey’s response is telling: “Even if the whole world is destroyed in a nuclear blast, there will be a cockroach deep down in the rubble.” With a fiery gaze blazing from beneath luxuriantly tousled eyebrows, he tears up the appeal, flings the pieces at Navin Kumar, and declares, “I am that cockroach.”

 

Like Pandey’s cockroach, the KIAs of the world are the ultimate survivors, thriving in the rubble of corporate or academic boredom.