Ayyankunnu
Grama Panchayat

   Ayyankunnu is a hilly village whose very name is linked to historical disputes. Old court records show that in 1912, a civil case in the Madras High Court involved a dispute over the ownership of Ayyankunnu between Sreemullayamparamba Devaswom and a person named Ayyar. One widely accepted view is that the hill region owned by Ayyar gradually came to be known as Ayyankunnu. Another view suggests that the indigenous people of the area used the name “Ayyankunnu” to refer to a land consisting of five hills. The region included lands belonging to the Parappuravan family and the Mullayamparamba Devaswom.

      Migration to the Malabar region began in the early 1940s, when strong protests against foreign rule spread across Travancore as part of the freedom struggle. With the emergence of the Travancore State Congress, the movement gained momentum, but the Diwan C. P. Ramaswami Iyer responded with strict and often repressive measures. Activists were falsely implicated, imprisoned, and subjected to severe brutality. The well-functioning Koyilon National Bank was also shut down on allegations of supporting Congress activities.

     During this period, severe food shortages, uncontrolled population growth, and diseases affecting coconut plantations pushed people into hardship. Seeking a better future for their families, many farmers left their homes and migrated, often arriving by train at Thalassery. In this journey, they discovered a new land—Ayyankunnu, then part of Aralam Village, consisting largely of forest land under the control of the Parappuravan family.

    The beginning of a new era of settlement took place in 1941, when Kavunkal Ulahannan, along with his sons Chacko, Mathai, and Joseph, and some relatives, reached Karikkottakkari. This marked the start of organized migration, which gradually spread across different parts of the region.

    Around the same time, a Frenchman arrived alone at Palathumkadavu, near the Karnataka border, seeking peace away from crowded urban life. Though many farming families who had settled there later abandoned the area, he remained determined, living in a raised hut and cultivating crops like rubber, cashew, coconut, and plantain. Despite repeated attacks by wild elephants that destroyed his crops and shelter, he resisted for several years. Eventually, after losing everything in a devastating elephant attack, he left the forest land.

    By 1947, migration had intensified, and the forest areas once owned by the Parappuravan family and Sreemullayamparamba Devaswom were largely transformed into cultivable agricultural land.