Politicians in crosshairs at Kannada literary meet

The spirit of Aam Aadmi concept seems to have crept into the Kannada literary field as well, with anger against corruption, political one-up-manship and nexus between political parties in protecting their own tribe surfacing for the first time in Kannada literary meets at the 80th Akhila Bharata Kannada Sahitya Sammelana.

The mood in the Sammelana venue at the Field Marshal Cariappa College at Madikeri was somber, and groups of writers engaged in discussions away from the routine sessions spoke about the changes that could bring in furtherance of Kannada’s development if there was a change in the political culture in the state.

One of the views that was heard loudly was that the existing political set up was not conducive for growth of Kannada in the changing social situation, but needed a “common man’s touch” to achieve that.

One such conversation with among a group laid hopes on common man, not politicians to save Kannada, as the ordinary citizen used Kannada as a medium of communication throughout his life.

“Of the seven crore people in Karnataka, at least five crore had great bond with Kannada, through their families, education, profession and community. They say minorities do not patronize Kannada, but we have great poets, writers and thinkers in Kannada like late BM Idinabba, our president Na D’Souza and many of their eminence, even the common people who have Urdu, Konkani and Tulu love Kannada, I feel Kannada is a great common man’s language and needs a common man’s approach and governance and not by high-handed political parties” said Lingappa Bellad of Belgaum, a delegate.

Echoing the statement of Kannada fighter Vatal Nagaraj at Bangalore to accord cabinet rank status for the Sahtiya Sammelana president at least for one year, Ramadas Mudholkar from Gangavati, said: “What Vatal says is absolutely right, politicians are creating many unwanted corporations and political bodies to rehabilitate their henchmen. They must at least do this favour to the person who has carried the interests of common man’s language for the best part of his life.”

Are they looking for an alternative political set up to take forward Kannada’s causes? There was huge “yes” from the group. “When we go back, we will start talking to our respective Kannada Sanghas and organize meetings over the political negligence that Kannada had suffered,” said Vishwas Gowda, a Kannada Chaluvali activist from Mandya.

The delegates have also aired dissatisfaction over the various pro-Kannada organizations functioning in the state and their proximity to political parties.

“We have to bring in a culture of looking at Kannada in relation to common man and pro-Kannada movements should be based on the socio-economic and political progress of common man which will leave a long-lasting effect,” said Gopal Ramachandran, activist from Aam Aadmi Party from Bangalore.

Even president of the 80th Kannada Sahitya Sammelana at Madikeri in has presidential address had criticized the casual attitude of politicians to Kannada. “Some of the grave incidents of neglect is in front of us. The Mahajan committee report and the Sarojini Mahishi report that recommended various steps to be taken by the government to improve the life of Kannadigas have been confined to cold storage for a long time,” D’Souza had said.

Kannada keyboard a need
“Even today as we talk about growth of Kannada in the cyber world, we write our stories and books with keyboards with English letters and it is such a shame. Technologists should come up with a Kannada keyboard,” said journalist Mohammad Ismail.  “Come to think of it, we have best of software companies of the world synergized with the hardware aspect in the silicon city of the world but Kannada keyboard is still a far cry,” he said.