Thrissur: Noted social activist and author T N Joy (Najmal N Babu) died in Kodungallur on Tuesday. The 72-year-old was one of the early Naxal leaders in Kerala.
Joy, a bachelor, was the state secretary of the undivided CPI-ML.
Joy was active in the Naxal movement in the 1970s and was an intellectual force of the movement. He was jailed during the Emergency and was tortured by the police. An author of several books, Joy was also active in the political and cultural fields in Thrissur. He ran a publishing house named Suryakanthi Books. It was his publishing company that introduced books of Italian Marxist philosopher Antonio Gramsci and several others to Keralites.
Joy, who led the protest seeking pension for those jailed during the Emergency, took part in campaigns like 'Kiss of love'. He was also active in the protest held by nuns in Kochi recently. He was a founder of Health Care Institute that works in the field of palliative care for cancer patients.
He was born in 1955 to Thaivalath Veettil Neelakantadas and Devayani, a Communist family in Kodungallur. His father, a member of Sahodaran Ayyappan's Sahohdaran Movement and an atheist, named his son Joy. While working as part of the movement, Neelakantadas named his uncle's daughter Aiysha. In 2015, T N Joy embraced Islam which generated much furore.
Joy had applied to the mosque committee requesting that his body be buried in Kodungallur Cheraman Juma Masjid.
His siblings include late CPI leader T N Kumaran, late historian Thaivalath Balakrishan, T N Vimaladevi and T N Susheeladevi. The biopic by actor and writer V K Sreeraman 'The Man Who Tried To Beautify The World' on Joy is noteworthy.
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