Informal and exclusive, the clique was controlled by two extended families, the
Vembaukum Iyengars, and the
Calamur Viravalli-Chetpet Iyers, and took its name from
the luxurious Madras City neighborhood in which many of its members kept mansions. The clique formed and began to exert influence during the 1880s and 1890s under the headship of
Sir V. Bhashyam Aiyangar and
Sir S. Subramania Iyer, with
R. Raghunatha Rao as a tertiary leader. Some argue that the clique reached its zenith between 1910 and 1920, while others highlight its influence in ministry and magistracy continuing into the 1920s and 1930s, with
Sir C. P. Ramaswami Iyer as leader. American historian
Eugene F. Irschick said of them, "the Mylapore Clique was most powerful in the High Court and the Judiciary, but its great influence permeated the
Secretariat at Fort St. George and all the Tamil District administrations. It was not without its ramifications in the more important Telugu Districts —
Guntur,
Kistna,
Godavaris,
Vizag, and
Bellary.' Affiliates and relatives of senior members - especially those related to the two dominant families - ascended the bureaucracy, magistracy, and business communities, under a government which had come to operate appointments using "the celebrated principle of the best-backed" candidates. One beneficiary was
Srinivasa Ramanujan, initially funded by clique member
R. Ramachandra Rao, then Collector of
Nellore and President of the
Indian Mathematical Society, who obtained for him a well-salaried accounting clerkship in the
Madras Port Trust, which was succeeded by a special scholarship at the
University of Madras secured by the advocacy of university vice-chancellor, Justice of the High Court, and clique leader
P. R. Sundaram Iyer. Senior members routinely served as judges and justices of the
High Court of Madras, as
Tehsildars and
district magistrates, as Ministers of the
Executive Council of the Governor of Madras and the
Legislative Council of Madras, in
Madras Corporation, and in similar offices; in parallel, they were often honoured by the British as
Companions or Knights Commander of the Order of the British Empire or
of the Order of the Star of India, and/or as
Knights Bachelor, with the
Kaisar-i-Hind Medal, as well as with the titles of
Rai or Rao Bahadur, and of
Dewan Bahadur. Members were mainstays as high as the
Viceroy's Executive Council, governing all
British India as it sat under the purview of their ministerial portfolios, and sat even on the
Privy Council of the United Kingdom and as
India's delegates to the
League of Nations, the
Round Table Conferences, and the
London Economic Conference of 1933. The Mylapore clique and its ur-elements were of central importance in the
Madras Mahajana Sabha,
Annie Besant developed close ties to the Mylapore set resulting in the exploration of
Theosophy by many Mylapore elites, and, after 1910, the metamorphosis of the set's regional machines, via
Theosophical Society branches into tools of nationalist mobilization, eventually resulting in
India's Home Rule Movement. Beyond conventional politics, the Mylapore clique was also active in long-running attempts to reform of the Madras Presidency's 75,000 Hindu temples as the
Dharmarakshana Sabha, against which British colonial administrators, increasingly wary, effectively waged a proxy war in the 1910s, although the
Sabha succeeded in obtaining its selectees' appointments to the administration of the richest of the presidency's temples through the courts. Opposition came at first, haphazardly, from
Triplicane Six ringleader and editor-in-chief of
the Hindu,
G. Subramania Iyer,
Egmore clique, backed by
S. Kasturi Ranga Iyengar, who in 1905 purchased control of
The Hindu; later, from, the
Justice Party; the
Self-Respect Movement and
Non-Brahmin movement, today known as the Dravidian movement are viewed by scholars as a reaction to and against Mylapore hegemony, while the Mylapore-Egmore rivalry proved crucial to the formation of the mature
Indian National Congress. == Senior members ==