Kausalya Shankar

Kausalya (born ) Her decision to get remarried was received well with wishes pouring in from many sections.

Biography Kausalya was born to P. Chinnasamy, an auto driver and financier, and Annalakshmi, a housewife in Kuppamapalayam village, Dindigul district in southern Tamil Nadu. She has a younger brother Gowtham. In 2007, the family moved to Palani when Kausalya was studying 6th standard. According to her brother, she was a good student, getting over 1000 marks in her 12th board exams, and was "allowed" to go to PA Engineering College in Pollachi in 2014. On the first day, she was met by Shankar, who proposed to her on their second day. Shankar came from an economically backward family. His father was a daily wager. At first she turned him down, but developed a strong friendship over the next six months that blossomed into romance. Relatives who saw her relationship with Shankar told her parents. Once they found out Shankar was a member of the Devendra kula vellalar community, who have clashed with Thevars before, they fought with Kausalya about her relationship with him. After this fight, Kausalya decided to marry Shankar and drop out of college in March 2015.

On 12 March 2016, Shankar and Kausalya left their hut and went to buy a new shirt for Shankar in Udumalaipettai. As they were returning from a clothing shop, they were about to cross the road to the bus stop. At that moment, six killers hired by Chinnasamy arrived on two motorbikes. In front of a large crowd, they attacked the couple, slashing them with long knives. After 36 seconds, they fled on the bikes. Shankar struggled to run away, while Kausalya was attacked again until she got under a car. An ambulance took the two to the hospital. Kausalya held her husband in her arms and he stopped breathing as they passed the hospital gate. Shankar had 34 cuts on him.

After the killing, she remained in hospital for 20 days. She also became an anti-caste and Dalit's rights activist, following the ideologies of B. R. Ambedkar and Periyar.

In popular culture The honour killing of Kausalya's first husband, Shankar, was the subject of two plays — Koumarane Valavane's Chandala: Impure and Sharmistha Saha's Romeo Ravidas and Juliet Devi. Their life was roughly depicted in the Tamil movie Magalir Mattum. However it was shown as alternative history where both survived and helped by the main protagonist, actress Jyothika.