Sir Thyagaraja Sadasiva Iyer (23 June 1861 – 1 December 1927) was an Indian

judge A judge is a person who presides over court proceedings, either alone or as a part of a panel of judges. A judge hears all the witnesses and any other evidence presented by the barristers or solicitors of the case, assesses the credibility an ...

and theosophist who served as the Chief Justice of Travancore from 1905 to 1910. He was also the first President of the Hindu Religious and Charitable Endowments Department,

Madras Presidency The Madras Presidency, or the Presidency of Fort St. George, also known as Madras Province, was an administrative subdivision (presidency) of British India. At its greatest extent, the presidency included most of southern India, including the ...

Early life and education

Sadasiva was born in a Tamil Brahmin family in

Kumbakonam Kumbakonam (formerly spelt as Coombaconum or Combaconum) or Kudanthai is a city municipal corporation in the Thanjavur district in the States of India, Indian state of Tamil Nadu. It is located from Thanjavur and from Chennai and is the headq ...

on 23 June 1861 to Mangudi Thyagaraja Iyer, who was a daayadhi (cousin by paternal lineage) to

Nobel Laureate The Nobel Prizes ( sv, Nobelpriset, no, Nobelprisen) are awarded annually by the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences, the Swedish Academy, the Karolinska Institutet, and the Norwegian Nobel Committee to individuals and organizations who make out ...

C. V. Raman Sir Chandrasekhara Venkata Raman (; 7 November 188821 November 1970) was an Indian physicist known for his work in the field of light scattering. Using a spectrograph that he developed, he and his student K. S. Krishnan discovered that when ...

. He belonged to the Mangudi Brahacharanam subsect. He was educated at

and

Madras Chennai (, ), formerly known as Madras ( the official name until 1996), is the capital city of Tamil Nadu, the southernmost Indian state. The largest city of the state in area and population, Chennai is located on the Coromandel Coast of th ...

and mastered in Hindu law. Sadasiva's younger brother was Justice

T Paramasiva Iyer Justice T. Paramasiva Iyer (1863–1943) was an Indian vedic scholar, writer and a District and Sessions Judge of Bangalore during the period of Maharaja Chamarajendra Wadiyar X and later went on to become the Chief Justice of the Mysore High ...

, the father of the Kannada playwright

T. P. Kailasam Tyagraj Paramasiva Iyer Kailasam (Kannada: ತ್ಯಾಗರಾಜ ಪರಮಶಿವ ಐಯ್ಯರ್ ಕೈಲಾಸಂ, 1884–1946), was an Indian playwright and prominent writer in the Kannada literature. Literary criticism in Kannada l ...

Judicial career

Sadasiva started his judicial career as an apprentice to Raja

T. Rama Rao Tatineni Rama Rao (1938 – 20 April 2022) was an Indian filmmaker. He directed 75 Hindi and Telugu language, Telugu feature films between 1966 and 2000. Career Rao started his work in the film industry in the late 1950s as the assistant direc ...

before enrolling as a ''vakil'' in the

Madras High Court The Madras High Court is a High Court in India. It has appellate jurisdiction over the state of Tamil Nadu and the union territory of Puducherry. It is located in Chennai, and is the third oldest high court of India after the Calcutta High C ...

. After joining service as District Munsiff of Madura in 1887 and District Judge

ust be Munsif; he became District Judge much later UST or Ust may refer to: Organizations * UST (company), American digital technology company * Equatorial Guinea Workers' Union * Union of Trade Unions of Chad (Union des Syndicats du Tchad) * United States Television Manufacturing Corp. * UST G ...

Tinnevely Tirunelveli (, ta, திருநெல்வேலி, translit=Tirunelveli) also known as Nellai ( ta, நெல்லை, translit=Nellai) and historically (during British rule) as Tinnevelly, is a major city in the Indian state of Tami ...

, Sadasiva Iyer was made a Sub-Judge in 1905. In 1905, he was appointed Chief Judge of Travancore High Court and served till 1910, when he reverted to British service and was posted as District and Sessions Judge of Ganjam. In 1912, Sadasiva was appointed judge of the Madras High Court as Additional Judge and served from 1912 till his retirement in 1921. In 1915 he was elected as Vice-President of the National Indian Association, Madras. In 1921, he was appointed President of the Hindu Religious and Charitable Endowments Department (

HR & CE The Hindu Religious and Charitable Endowments Department of the Government of Tamil Nadu manages and controls the temple administration within the state. The Tamil Nadu Hindu Religious and Charitable Endowments Act XXII of 1959 controls 36,425 ...

), newly established by the Justice Party government of the

Raja of Panagal Raja Sir Panaganti Ramarayaningar KCIE (9 July 1866 – 16 December 1928), also known as the Raja of Panagal, was a ''zamindar'' of Kalahasti, a Justice Party leader and the Chief Minister or Premier of Madras Presidency from 11 July 19 ...

. Parthasarathi, p 53 He was made a Knight Bachelor in the King's Birthday Honours' List of 1921.

Theosophical Society and Social Reform

Sadasiva was an active member of the Theosophical Society presiding over several meetings and serving as the General Secretary of its India Section from 1924-1925. In 1918,

Annie Besant Annie Besant ( Wood; 1 October 1847 – 20 September 1933) was a British socialist, theosophist, freemason, women's rights activist, educationist, writer, orator, political party member and philanthropist. Regarded as a champion of human f ...

and the leaders of the Home Rule League established the Wood's College at Madanapalle as the first National University, Sadasiva Iyer was appointed as its Vice Chancellor and Rabindranath Tagore its Chancellor.

Death

Sadasiva died at

on 1 December 1927 at the age of 66.

Family

Sadasiva married his maternal cousin, Mangalammal. The couple had five sons (Viswanathan, Krishnamurthy, Thyagarajan, Swaminathan, and Ramachandran) and three daughters (Balamma, Syamala, and Parvati). His brother in law was Dewan Bahadur

R. V. Srinivasa Aiyar Diwan Bahadur Rishiyur Venkata Srinivasa Aiyar (1852 – 31 March 1909) was an Indian civil servant, legislator and politician from the Madras Presidency. Early life and education Srinivasa Aiyar was born to R. S. Venkatarama Aiyar and ...

References

* * {{DEFAULTSORT:Iyer, T. Sadasiva 1861 births 1927 deaths Indian Knights Bachelor Knights Bachelor People from Tiruvarur district 19th-century Indian judges Dewan Bahadurs 20th-century Indian judges