The success story of Pandit Basanna Konalli is not a run-of-the-mill one. He could have - like thousands of others - gone unsung had he not exhibited a zeal to excel in life. For a poor individual from a scheduled caste, braving untouchability and other social hostilities to carve a niche for himself - that too, in higher education - is probably beyond one’s imagination.
Pandit Basanna Konalli continues to remain a perfect role model not only to dalits, but to non-dalits as well. He has created a history of sorts by bagging the maximum number of gold medals (seven) in the Master of Arts (MA) Kannada course, Gulbarga university. Basanna, with all humility, walked into the 26th annual convocation dais amidst thumping applause. As the registrar announced each gold medal, the applause reached its crescendo.
Hailing from Sarasamba village in Aland taluk, Basanna lost his father when he was in the seventh standard. The family neither owns land, nor had a definite source of income. “We were required to make our living on my mother Seetamma’s labour. My paternal uncle helped me a lot. But unfortunately he is not here today to witness this glory,’’ said Basanna trying to prevent tears from rolling down - he lost his uncle only a fortnight ago.
Basanna says he would think of nothing but studies. In his hostel, he would burn the midnight oil when his colleagues were asleep. He would go to bed in the wee hours when some of his colleagues would wake to begin their studies. Uncaring of the quality of food or material inadequacies, he remained in the pursuit of his academic career. He said he dreamt of achieving something unusual, and was happy to have realised his dream.
Basanna always had a fascination for Kannada language and literature. His intense love for the language has helped him get where he is today - and he now wants to complete his research and become a Kannada lecturer.
He has bagged six gold medals for scoring the highest marks in MA (Kannada) and the seventh for scoring highest marks in MA Kannada Linguistics / Comparative Dravidian Linguistics. The first seven gold medals have been instituted in the names of Late Pandurang Rao Deshmukh, State Bank of Hyderabad, P S Annapurnaiah, Dr Anupama Niranjan,  Ratnamma Sangareddy Patil, Late Basappa Sabarad, and the seventh one in the name of Dr Sangamesh Savadatti Math.