K. Shivaram Karanth - Effect of His Works

Effect of His Works

He was awarded Jnanapith for his book Mookajjiya Kanasugalu (literally "the dreams of a mute grandmother") which tries to unveil the secrets of nature. The story revolves around a Granny and her visions on various aspects of life, from religion to social relationships. Its all about the conversations between granny and Subbaraya alias Subbanna that runs throughout the book on various issues that he encounters in his life. Subbanna being skeptical about blind beliefs that people are having on several religious customs, poses several questions regarding it to his Granny. Granny being a great visionary answers to all of his questions with true substance. Subbanna, to fulfill his desire to know the truth about existence of an old civilization in that village, goes into the surrounding woods in search of any evidence. There he collects bones as part of his evidence from the caves and shows that to his granny. He also explains her, what he had seen in those caves and narrates his horrifying dreams about the same caves. Again his granny reveals the secret behind those bones and caves after looking at them - with shocking facts about the civilization. He has brilliantly carved the story to address many issues like evolution of human life, the origin and after effects of blind beliefs that are being followed in the society, values of human relationships in one’s life. The granny is given a supernatural power to see the past and future, through which she answers to all complex questions about life. Being himself a non science student he has written a series of science related books which are very useful for children of 20th Century, as there were no such books in Kannada during those days.

His main literary works are Mookajjiya Kanasugalu, Marali Mannige, Chomana Dudi,Alida Mele, Bettada Jeeva etc. He has written an autobiography, Hucchu Manasina Hatthu Mukhagaluin earlier days and he wrote second part of his autobiography also which is called "Smrathipataladinda"!

He attempted to improve the lives of common people by entering into politics of his day, by contesting in an election, unsuccessfully, in Karnataka on the issues of environmentalism. His symbol was elephant and although he got substantial chunk of votes, he could not win, as he abstained from canvassing for the election. He led a movement to oppose an Atomic energy plant at Kaiga near Karwar as the plant may pose danger to the lives of people and as it leads to destruction of forest. But the movement failed miserably and ironically, the dome of Kaiga Atomic energy plant collapsed at the time of construction itself! He is also known for strong and sharp tongue and he being a good orator, earned a nickname "Kadala Theerada Bhargava". (Bhargava means Parashurama). He used to raise his voice on several issues ranging from conservation work at Hampi to Art forms of Karnataka to environmental issues.

His Novel "Sarasammana Samadhi" deals with the "sati" system, and the cunningness and hypocrisy of the Indian society. "Marali Mannige" is a novel dealing with three generations and at the end the product of third generation comes back to native place. "Mai Managala Suliyalli" is a fine novel dealing with the lady singer/dance community of Basrur, and though it is wonderfully written, may be due to the delicate nature of the subject, it could not get due importance. "Bettada Jeeva" is one of the finest novels of 20th Century covering the life of old couple living in an arecanut garden surrounded by forest, eternally expecting their son to return from Bombay or some other urban place.

An institution, the Center of Advanced Studies, was established in his name at Mangalore University in 1990.