lit a candle 5h agoReading about this over coffee, not sure why it hit me the way it did. Eighty years old, cardiac arrest, found at his home in Thanjavur. Never been to Tamil Nadu, don't know the first thing about Indian politics really, but the line that stuck was him riding out to the fields to hear his farmers, going to where the people actually were instead of waiting for them to show up at some office. You don't hear about that kind of thing much anymore. Anyway. Rest well, sir. Edited to add, just saw he beat a sitting minister in 2016, that's a hell of a thing to pull off at seventy.
Their story
M. Ramachandran, known to party workers and voters across Thanjavur district simply as M.R., was an Indian lawyer and politician of the Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (DMK) who served three terms in the Tamil Nadu Legislative Assembly. He represented Thiruvonam after the 1989 and 1996 elections and Orathanadu from 2016 to…
M. Ramachandran, known to party workers and voters across Thanjavur district simply as M.R., was an Indian lawyer and politician of the Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (DMK) who served three terms in the Tamil Nadu Legislative Assembly. He represented Thiruvonam after the 1989 and 1996 elections and Orathanadu from 2016 to 2021.
He came from Pinnaiyur, a village near Orathanadu in the Cauvery delta. After studying for BA and BL degrees he practised as an advocate, and colleagues remembered him for giving legal help to ordinary people who could not otherwise afford it. He was a close associate of the DMK patriarch M. Karunanidhi and spent his whole political life in the party, later serving on its head executive committee.
Ramachandran first won Thiruvonam in 1989, lost it in 1991, regained it in 1996 and lost again in 2001. In 2006 the DMK gave the seat to an ally, the Pattali Makkal Katchi, a decision that drew protests from his local supporters. His most celebrated victory came in 2016. Named as a late replacement candidate for Orathanadu only weeks before polling, he defeated the sitting minister R. Vaithilingam, who had held the farming constituency at the previous three elections, a result the press described as a giant killing. He contested Orathanadu again in 2021 but was not elected.
DMK president M. K. Stalin, who led the opposition during Ramachandran's last term, said he had followed and admired his speeches in the Assembly. Stalin recalled a man who lived among the people, riding his Bullet motorcycle out to the fields to hear villagers' complaints and then arguing for solutions on the floor of the House.
M. Ramachandran died on the morning of Monday 2 November 2026 at the age of 80. He collapsed at his home in RMS Colony on Nanjikottai Road in Thanjavur and was declared dead at a private hospital; reports attributed his death to a cardiac arrest. Udhayanidhi Stalin, Leader of the Opposition in the Assembly, paid his respects at the house, and the funeral was held at Pinnaiyur on 3 November. He was survived by his wife Poomani, his son Dr Thirunthaiyan and his daughter Dr Abirami.
Biography adapted from Wikipedia (CC BY-SA 4.0), DT Next, Dinamani, Dinamalar and Dinakaran. Wikipedia ↗
Photos
1M. Ramachandran, former Orathanadu MLA
by People Forever
