The Emergency left behind many indelible memories — stories of resistance and brutal repression across India. Each State had its victims who would not live to tell their tales. If it was the young student Rajan in Kerala and actor Snehalatha Reddy in Karnataka, then in Tamil Nadu, it was C. Chittibabu — former Mayor of Chennai and DMK MP from Chengalpattu — who paid the ultimate price. He died on January 4, 1977, at the age of 41.
Chittibabu was imprisoned in the Madras Central Prison, a notorious site of brutality during the Emergency. It was there that he received a brutal lathi assault after shielding a young M.K. Stalin from attack inside a prison cell. He never recovered. “I was beaten mercilessly, and former Mayor Chittibabu, who formed a shield to protect me, later succumbed to the injuries,” Mr. Stalin recalled a decade ago.
