Archive / Papers / Jayarajan Papers

Description

Small Collections Box 14

Given by Mr C. Leakey.

  1. Photocopy of memoir: ‘Facets of my life under the British Raj’, by Paul M. Jayarajan. (Colombo, 1984.)The author was born in 1910 into a distinguished Ceylonese Christian family. (His father, Dr S.C. Paul, was the first Ceylonese to gain an F.R.C.S..) Having been awarded a scholarship to Emmanuel College, Mr Jayarajan spent five years in Cambridge first as an undergraduate and then as an I.C.S. probationer. Mr Jayarajan was appointed to the Madras cadre of the Indian Civil Service and took up his first posting in 1933 as Assistant Collector and Magistrate of Malabar District. At this juncture he changed his name from Marcus Jayarajan Paul to Paul M. Jayarajan.

    A variety of postings followed: 1936, Sub-Collector and Magistrate, Palghat; 1937, City Magistrate, Madurai; 1938, Sub-Collector and Joint Magistrate, Shermadevi; 1939, Under Secretary, Home Department in the Madras Government. His final appointment was a Collector of Bangalore in 1945, a post which he held until his retirement from the ICS in 1949. Following his retirement he held senior appointments in Ceylon and Uganda.

    The memoir contains descriptions of Government protocol of the period, of the life of tea planters in the Ceylon highlands, of the matrilineal inheritance laws of Cochin and of the panic affecting the Madras Government in 1942 when a Japanese attack appeared imminent. One also catches a glimpse of family life amongst the well-to-do, professional class of Ceylonese and Indians, both Hindu and Christian. 66pp.

  2. ‘Historical truths of the legend relating to Prince Vijaya’, by Paul M. Jayarajan. (Colombo, n.d.) 67pp.
  3. ‘History of the evolution of the Sinhala alphabet’, by Paul M. Jayarajan. (Colombo, n.d.) 83pp.