Billy Nair (27 November 1929 – 23 October 2008) was a South African politician, a member of the National Assembly of South Africa, an anti-apartheid activist and a political prisoner in Robben Island.
Nair was a long-serving political prisoner on Robben Island along with Nelson Mandela in the 'B' Block for political prisoners. His Prison card is the copy used in the post-reconciliation prison tours to illustrate the conditions of the prisoners of the time. He was elected to the African National Congress (ANC) executive committee in 1991 and was a South African member of parliament for two terms prior to his retirement in 2004.
His given name was ITTYNIAN Rungasamy Nair.It was then changed to Billy Nair after the 1956 Treason Trial.
Early life
Nair was born in Sydenham, Durban in the then province of Natal, to Indian parents on 27 November 1929. His parents were Parvathy(daughter of a Passenger Indian) and Krishnan Nair (Ittynian Nair) who had been brought from Kerala, India as an indentured labourer. He was one of five children; his siblings were Joan, Angela, Jay and Shad. His youngest brother died of typhoid in 1942. His father was an illiterate ship cargo man and mother supplemented the income by owning a vegetable stall in the Indian market.
He attended school in Essendene Road Government Aided Indian School in Sydenham and Natal Technikon or M.L. Sultan Technical College (see Durban University of Technology), Durban at night and completed his matriculation in 1946 and diploma in accounting in 1949. During his school year, he also worked part-time as a shop assistant from 1946 - 48 for a timber merchant of Indian origin and as a bookkeeper for an accounting firm.
Early political activism
During his education days, he was politicized as a participant in the students union. Like many of his fellow leaders in the future, the "Asiatic Land Tenure and Indian Representation Act", also known as the "Ghetto Act" galvanized his political beliefs. In 1949, he became a member of the Natal Indian Youth Congress and was elected as its secretary in 1950. He started attending Natal Indian Congress (NIC) meetings becoming a member of its executive in 1950.
Billy Nair continued his string of jobs and matriculation. After the National Party government came to power in 1948, the position of the authorities towards the protesters became very hostile. After six months stint as a dairy worker at Clover Dairy earning 24 pounds a month, he was fired in 1950 as a result of his trade union activities. As he explained in an interview in 1984 about this period, "We had to politicize workers. A means to establish a link between political struggle and the struggle for higher wages had to be found". He continued his trade union activities, eventually becoming the full-time secretary of the Dairy Worker's Union in 1951. He was banned from political activities as part of the ban imposed in Natal of all that had served as secretaries of 16 trade unions under the Suppression of Communism Act.
Nair came under the influence of Dr. G. M. "Monty" Naicker, president of the Natal Indian Congress. In the resistance again the Ghetto act, no fewer than 2000 prisoners were arrested. Nair was among the first group of resisters who were arrested at the Berea station with 21 other fellow-protesters for entering a "Europeans only" waiting room. He was imprisoned for one month.
In 1953 Nair joined the secretly reconstituted South African Communist party and was a leading member of the South African Congress of Trade Unions when it was formed in 1955 and served on its national executive committee.
Nair was among the 150 activists arrested with Mandela on 5 December 1956 and charged with treason. The marathon Treason Trial of 1956–1961 followed. Two months into the trial, the initial indictment was dropped, and immediately a new indictment was issued against 30 people, all ANC members. He was acquitted of all charges. Speaking of the incident, Nair later remarked, "The State wanted to actually bottle us up, thinking that the struggle will die out..."