Kumari Malar

Kumari malar: (1943-1983) is a monthly magazine that came under the editorship of A. K. Chettiyar. It did not publish any fictional works and dedicated completed for general knowledge and research.

Editor

A.k. chettiyar is the one who travelled around the world several times. He was known for his writings on these travels and experiences. First documentary film on Gandhi was taken and released by him.

Publication

A.k.Chettiyar was moreinvolved towards Gandhi. He started kumari malar in April, 1943 with the aim of spreading gandhian principles and general knowledge among people.

Since it was during the period of second world war, the British government imposed many restrictions for publishing magazines. Hence ak chettiyar planned to publish kumarimalar in the form of individual book which was also a monthly magazine. As per his plan this magazine came out as an individual book for each volume every month. To denote this, a caption reading ‘A book every month’ also appeared in the first page.

The magazine came out with same front page layout with only background colours changing for each volume. It was not sold on any bookshops and sent only to those who voluntarily subscribed. Number of copies printed was around 500 only and it was priced at 50 paise. It was printed on saadhu printing press owned by the brother of Thiru.v.K.

Content:

Topics like Tamil literature, psychology, handicraft, spirituality and politics took place in kumari malar. In each volume it contained many articles, preaching compiled from various books and important information published from other magazines.

Annuals which came out every year contained information on rare documentaries, global news and other information. World travel experiences of ak chettiyar also took place in these volumes. Advertisements which were useful to people appeared in each volume.

Contributors

Rajaji, bharathidasan, raya. Sokkalingan

Other information

AK Chettiyar’s travel experiences were compiled and released as book under the name of ‘kumari malar veliyeedugal’

All travel books of Ak chettiyar was published through kumara malar publication only.

Ak chettiyar had special interest towards old magazines and manuscripts. He travelled to many places and collected these rare books from the attics of houses. Among them content relevant to pubic was published in kumari malar.