Why do Tamil people associate so much more with being a Tamilian than being an Indian (Read Description)?

Tamil Nadu is in India, So Obviously it means Indian only. Do u agree that Tamil nadu is in India ?? If so, Obviously it means India only, So pls stop asking these stupid questions.

I'm a north Indian born in Tamil Nadu. I think there are many reasons why it seems that they are proud to be more Tamilian. Historic reasons: Tamil culture is very much ancient and rich and surely any Tamil should be proud of their rich past and culture. Tamils have produced many scholars, poets, and freedom fighters. Political reasons: Now this aspect is what interests me the most. Right after Independence when states were being formed, it was not only Tamil leaders, but many Malayali and other South Indian leaders who opposed the 'imposition' of Hindi on them. They didn't want a language unknown to them to be made a language of national importance, and I can say it's quite natural to be reluctant to accept a language which is very much different than their own. Many political parties then began to glorify Tamil culture and protest against making Hindi as the national or official language. As everyone knows the Central Government then found out a way to make the South Indian leaders happy and also much to everyone's relief linguistic states were formed. But....after many years we can see that Malayalis, Telugus, and Kannadas have no problem in learning Hindi. I've studied in Kerala and the State Board of education has Hindi even in their board exams!( At least when I was studying}.  But Tamil people are still reluctant to learn Hindi, because it's the political parties that fill the sense of insecurity in the minds of people. They still remember the days of 'Protest of Hindi imposition' as a glorious struggle( I understand the protests were necessary, but they just exaggerate it). I also observed that political parties here never care about issues related to national interest and I never heard them say 'Jai Hind' or even 'India Vazhge'. TN chief minister's show of sympathy towards the killers of Rajiv Gandhi and her advocating for their release is quite dirty politics. Majority of people in the name of 'Tamil sentiment' might agree with her but about the crime those killers committed? Any sentiment is not an excuse for the crimes one commit. Political parties of other states do mention about nationality even though they are much biased to caste, religion or community. Present scenario: Tamil youth of present generation are much open minded now. They do realize the importance of learning Hindi. Even though very few really try to understand it but the 'anti-Hindi' sentiment is very rare among the Tamil youth these days. But once again I'm talking about the urban and educated youth. I don't know about the rural youth. But I do hope that they love their ethnicity and at the same time be fiercely patriotic about India. India's past will be incomplete if we don't remember many great Tamil leaders, writers, mathematicians and entrepreneurs. India without Tamil Nadu is unimaginable, something that we North Indians don't realize. Any educated North Indian should respect the Tamil culture and their language instead of making fun of it like in the picture 'Chennai Express'. Instead of asking why they don't know Hindi, we should have a positive way of popularizing it. And after watching Shah Rukh Khan in 'Ra.One' and 'Chennai Express' would any one want to learn a language that mocks their culture? I also wanna say that Tamil people too can have an open mind about Hindi. Learning Hindi has many benefits without doubt and it's not as hard as they think. In the end we all are Indians. No matter what other individuals think of themselves, we should always think of ourselves as Indians, glorifying India with all the vivid cultural past it possess.

Tamilians suffer from a severe state of identity crisis. They have endured whatever the rest of India had imposed on them, when they no reason to be a part of the Indian union. The argument for this goes back to the time when tamilians wanted the Madras presidency as a separate country. They felt that there was nothing wrong in demanding it, since the north and south were totally unrelated historically, racially and culturally, According to them, just because two adjacent regions were colonized by the British and people in those regions fought together for independence, they don't become a single country (Sri Lanka was also ruled by the British, but it never became a part of the Indian Union). But tamilian claims were never supported. Moreover, Madras had to accede to the formation of the southern states after independence, which was a huge blow (Take rivers,  for instance). Then the government tried to thrust hindi down their throats, which didn't go very well. A whole lot of other things have happened against the will of tamilians till now. To make matters worse, there was always some tamilian behind those events (For instance, it was C. Rajagopalachari who urged tamilians to embrace Hindi). This has led to an identity crisis in them. The only things that give them the sense of identity is the region (TN) and its language. This problem will fade away. But it takes time. After all, the north of India was united for over 24 centuries (it happened during the Mauryan rule in 3rd century BC) but it has not yet been a single century since India got united. Give the tamilians some time. Note: I am a tamilian. This post is not about how I feel, but how a stereotypical tamilian would feel. I apologize if this post hurts the sentiments of any individual.

"A  guy talking about Sanskrit being one of the oldest languages is usually  doing it in the context of pride for India or glorifying India." A person associated with Dravida Pride movement does not see it this way. He associates Sanskrit as something distinctly North-Indian, which is acknowledged as "Real Indian" and forced down his throat. He wonders why a North-Indian language is considered a National Symbol while an ancient South Indian language such as proto-Dravidian or Old-Dramil is ignored and not considered a National Symbol, the same way Sanskrit is. There is a strong resistance in TN towards anything North-Indian being acknowledged as Indian. This is why you can see instances where Hindi is desecrated, Sanskrit-origin words are avoided in Tamil and also the statue of the poet Thiruvalluvar is placed adjacent to Vivekanada's Ashram in a competitive fashion. There are two sides to the story, of course.

We don't even know if Sanskrit is being spoken or taught in any particular place in India (recently I heard that there are group of people speaking Sanskrit as regional language in India, so, don't fight with me about this!), but, we know that Tamil is one of the oldest language and being spoken in one full state. So, it has its own identity. All the more, we learn Tamil and English as main languages (we don't have Hindi much, let's take that as different debate) our exposure to Tamil is so high. All the North Indians speak Hindi generally, though they have their own regional language, almost everybody knows Hindi. Other languages, I suppose, mostly take Hindi as origin. Hindi and Telugu has originated from Sanskrit (to the best of my knowledge - you can correct me if I am wrong, please don't start a debate!). As far as I know, Kannada looks similar to Telugu. I don't have much knowledge about Malayalam, its origin (Tamil I guess), any great literature in it, how proud those people are - so, I am not touching upon that here. Having said all these, Sanskrit or Tamil is one of the ancient language - so, Tamil being spoken by us, we are definitely proud of it. I have not been big fan of Tamil letters, as all of you know that we have only "ka" representing, "ka", "kha", "ga" & "gha" - this always made me have trouble in reading Sanskrit Slokas in Tamil. But, recently I realized (when teaching letters to my son), how easy the language is, self sufficient with just 30 letters ( English with 26 letters has difficulty in reading without understanding phonics)!!! - Yes, I am very proud to have known such a language (BTW, my mother tongue is different, just that I grew up in Chennai). You can also boast about some of the literary works in your native language. We don't stop you. Literary works are great way of learning a language and easy way of teaching how to live our life! (my experience in teaching some/wanting to teach some of them for my son). In that way, yes, Thirukural is great literary work that we have got. Talk about any field, there will be 10 poems in it (just two lines each, with such a powerful message). Yes, it is in Tamil - is it in any other language? First of all we know nothing much about the author  - did you ever know that? - So, it is not about the author at all, it is about how great the work is, and so, it is in Tamil - I don't understand what is wrong in saying that it is in Tamil, when it is! I really don't understand how your ignorance of not knowing which state Kabir belongs even after getting exposed to his dohas for long time, becomes advantage to your point and disadvantage for we are proud of Thirukural. I don't know if you have ever had Kabir dohas in your school syllabus, but we all had Thirukural (all those who take Tamil as second language) every year! - we all get to see it even in public buses. We get to use them when we need some reference during tough situations. For us, it is like proverbs that are there in any language (though we have proverbs too!) I buy your point about "Tamil Vazhga" rather than "Vande Mataram" or "Jai Hind". Yes, we only get to hear "Tamil Vazhga" from politicians rather than any other phrases. You should understand that politicians mostly know only Tamil ( don't know English or Hindi), we can't expect much more than that from them. What do you want us (general public) to do about it? Other than politicians, does anybody say that always or at least given a chance to talk about greatness about Tamil, do you hear your friends/Tamilians say "Tamil Vazhga"? - I bet, you cannot. We are not trained that way! You may very well come up with more instances. Not that I want to defend us at any cost. Just that, whatever you mentioned is really important to us, so we take pride in them. You may have to put yourself in our shoes to understand it better!

The main reason for this is their continuous culture for over centuries without much of external influence.. The Language Tamil is older than Hindi and has far more antiquity. It is common for people with such a culture and language to have pride. Tamilians tend to protect their culture. Accepting Hindi as National language will abate the importance of tamil gradually. This is possible as we see english is subduing local Indian languages gradually in the urban areas already.

>A guy talking about Tamil does not associate it with India This generalization is a falsification; perhaps it's more relevant to those Goans who are still bitter about 'losing' Goa from Portuguese. I might be a Tamilian or Telugu or maybe none. Nevertheless, I introduced myself to many friends from different countries as a Sanskritian. But, I'm not a North Indian! :)

I am tamilan . I find my necessity to clear your doubts. People always find me rude, anti-Indian just because I write what I believe which are against their ideas on this topic. So, with all due respect accept this answer polite and kind .:-) It was British who created a country called British India , and after independence it became The republic of India . pre-colonization , India was merely a geographical representation of all the countries in Indian subcontinent ,just like middle-east , siberia . . . how many school books teach it ?? patriotism is something which are bounded with culture and heritage , Tamilagam aka , Tamil nadu and kerala was Independent nation with indigenous culture and heritage . British , who united all as one "british india" for their better governance helped Hindustan , aka bharath , aka India fight as one for the independence. Since this struggle lasted for a century , the fight almost united all the nations and leftover nations of claimed Hindustan of pre-colonization kingdoms. Pride of Tamils is actually patriotism we have for our land and identity , we have been taught about our history, culture, heritage as a part of our livelihood. I am happy to be a part of "The republic of India" , and i am proud to be a Tamilan . To be specific , Tamil nadu and Tamil have a emotional bonding with me by blood . India helps me to provide me status of citizen by records and protects my identity and my pride of being Tamil  by "The constitution of India" ( more like family and friend) . I will fight and stand for India against the world as a gratitude for what i am enjoying from it . But i will even die for Tamil and Tamil nadu against the whole world even against my India if there is a need . People who can understand the freedom of Kashmirs from both India and Pakistan can understand us too . PS- no one is asking Tamil nadu to be separated from India like kashmir , India can possibly be a country only if we all understand and respect the differences we have . Provided,only untill we are not provoked by political morons to inject national language or to humiliate us by our identity . SL should be a lesson for all of us .

Ya I know there exists this kind of feeling but its not entirely the fault of Tamilians Compare kabir das and Tiruvalluvar how many of Indian except Tamilian have heard about Tiruvallur? How many of them have heard about Bharathiar a great poet of national importance Kamaraaj,rajaji important national leaders any one? My point is if non Tamilian dont know about them how can one tell they are Indian first but not Tamilian. There is no problem in accepting CV Raman and Ramanujan APJ  as Indian no one thinks they are Tamil first because they have national acceptance.    Also Tamilians are forced to make Tamil persons as great idols compared to other great Indian people because of lack of recognition of them out of Tamil Nadu.