Akilan

Akilandam, better known by his pen name Akilan, was an Indian writer and novelist who wrote in Tamil. He was attracted by Gandhian philosophy during his school days and he discontinued his college education at Pudukkottai to join the freedom struggle. Later, after Indian independence, he joined the Railway Mail Service, after which he joined the All India Radio and became a full-fledged writer. His stories began to appear mostly in small magazines. He was awarded the Sahitya Academy Award and the Jnanpith Award by the Government of India for his novels Vengayin Mainthan and Chitra Pavai in 1963 and 1975 respectively. He was born on 27 June at Perungalur, Pudukkottai District. He spent his childhood in a village called Perungalur near Pudukkottai. His father Vaithiya Lingam Pillai was an accounts officer and adored his only son Akilan very much. Unfortunately, the boy lost his loving father at an early age. But his mother Amirthammal was a loving person, and being a creative person herself, she moulded her son into a writer.