Muhammed Yusuf Khan

Muhammad Yusuf Khan (1725– 15 October 1764) or Maruthanayagam (Marudhanayagam) Pillai was born in Pannaiyur, Ramanathapuram District, Tamil Nadu, India in 1725. From humble beginnings, he became a warrior in the Arcot troops, later Commandant for the British East India Company troops. The British and the Arcot Nawab used him to suppress the Polygars (Palayakkarar) in the south of Tamilnadu. Later he was entrusted to administrating the Madurai country when the Madurai Nayaks rule ended.

Later a dispute arose with the British and Arcot Nawab, and three of his associates were bribed to capture Yusuf Khan; he was hanged in 1764 in Madurai.

Early years

Maruthanayagam (or Mathuranayagam ) alias Yusuf Khan was born circa 1725 in the village of Panaiyur, in Rammnad 'country' in a Hindu farming family of the Pillai Vellala caste. Being too restless in his youth, he left his native village, and converted to Islam. To make a living, he served as a domestic hand at the residence of the French Governor Monsr Jacques Law in Pondicherry. It was here he befriended another French, Marchand (a subordinate of Jacques Law), who later became captain of the French force under Yusuf Khan in Madurai. Whether Yusuf Khan was dismissed from this job or left...
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