One redeeming feature of the 74th Kannada Sahitya Sammelana which just concluded at Udupi was that for the first time in many years, the politicians took a back seat at this literary meet thanks to the fact that Karnataka has come under President’s rule. The prestige associated with the Sammelana began to lose its sheen about three decades ago when Kannada Sahitya Parishat began the unedifying practice of inviting the chief minister of the day to inagurate the conference. Until the 1970s, the Sammelana had been a platform for literary giants to present their views and vision on matters pertaining the state’s language, culture and contemporary issues which used to be discussed and debated over  three days. But, with the intrusion of politicians -- on the pretext that the conference was being financed by the government -- the Sammelana’s presiding deity perforce had to be take the back seat.

Prof L S Seshagiri Rao, who presided over this year’s conference, fortunately did not to have share the limelight with anyone else and used the opportunity to share his anguish over the ‘deteriorating’ state of Kannada language in its motherland. Noting the marginalisation of Kannada in the administration, schools and even day-to-day dealings, he called for concerted effort from everyone to ‘save’ the language. The conference also debated the failure of the state government to effectively adopt Kannada in computer language, though many individual efforts have been made to develop the Kannada software. The Central government came in for sharp criticism for its failure to accord  classical status to Kannada despite the historians offering evidence to show that the language is more than 1,800 years old.

Though the Udupi conference seems to have set some sort of a record for the good food served to thousands of delegates who thronged this temple town, the “food” for the mind seems to have been not very appetising. The various sessions registered rather thin attendance, with the “kavi sammelan” – a popular event, generally – getting a very poor response, perhaps because of its late timing. As the Sammelana concept is entering its diamond jubilee next year, the Sahitya Parishat office-bearers will be the first to admit that a certain sense of ennui has set in in the way the conferences are being held. Perhaps a time has come to put in fresh ideas to re-energise it, make it more compact and purposeful and somehow bring the old magic which seems to have been lost somewhere along the way.