JOIN USJnanpith awardees come alive in City
When English is making inroads into Kannada, slowly routing out its presence, an elected representative has embarked upon a novel idea to bring alive the literary giants who have made Kannada literary world proud.
All the seven jnanpith awardees have been brought back to life in a board on Adhichunchanagiri main road in Kuvempunagar. A board in the corner of Dr Poornachandra Tejasvi Circle near Cauvery School is painted with the portraits of ‘Rashtrakavi’ Kuvempu, Da Ra Bendre, Dr Masti Venkatesha Iyengar, Dr Shivaram Karanth, Dr Vinayaka Krishna Gokak, Dr U R Ananthamurthy and Dr Girish Karnad.
Corporator of the ward K V Mallesh, an ardent fan of the language and also poets couldn’t think of anything better when the board painted earlier with area map was looking ugly with the onslaught of publicity materials.
He thought of re-introducing the noble souls and that was how the doyens of Kannada literature found place here. However, he admits that due to space crunch, he could only paint the names and portraits of the litterateurs, but not about the award winning works and the year they bagged the coveted honour.
Another board on the same row is painted with the portraits of Kuvempu and his son and master story writer Poornachandra Tejasvi in the backdrop of Kuvempu’s ancestral house in Kuppalli. Coincidentally, the particular ward is also the abode of many litterateurs like Dr Prabhushankar, Dr S L Bhyrappa, Devanur Mahadeva to name a few and the locality is named after Kuvempu again.
Yet another board wears a new look with the portraits of last Maharaja of Mysore Jayachamaraja Wadiyar and Dewan Sir M Visvesvaraya in the backdrop of famous Amba Vilas Palace.
Mallesh said he surveyed eight to 10 such boards in the ward that had turned into notice boards. He also has plans to redo the remaining boards with the works that could highlight the significance of tourism, for what Mysore is famous for, environment and other people-friendly works.
That apart, he has conceived the idea of naming the circles in his ward after jnanpith awardees. You may be surprised, Mallesh just has SSLC for his qualification, but when it comes to love for literature he is no less than any litterateur.