English
Padmanabh Srichandan a poet in the tradition of ornate poetry (riti kavya), belonged to the royal family of Banki, in the district of Cuttack, and ruled from 1735 to 1757. odisha was then under the Muslim rule which was shortly followed by the Maratha rule. In ancient times, Balabhadra Dhall, a prince from Dhalbhumi came to Banki and became its king. The political history of Banki, a small principality, is
later marked by the rule of a dynasty whose royal title, Srichandan, was granted either by the Raja of Puri or Khurda. Padmanabh was the contemporary of king Ramchandra II and Birakishore of Khurda.
Padmanabh was a person imbued with scholarship and poetic genius. He was also a lover of sports. His chief poetical work, Sashirekha, is an outstanding literary product divided into thirty-six cantos. It is an imaginative kavyadesigned on the model of the famous kavya Labanyabati by Upendra Bhanja, the most outstanding poet in the ornate genre. The first canto contains benediction, worship of Lord Jagannath, the union of Lakshmi Narayan and the prayer to Lord Jagannath to bless the poet to write and complete Sashirekha.
The following cantos weave round the story of Lord Shiva and his consort Parvati from whose fancies Kanjanan and Chandrakanti were born. Both being of exquisite beauty felt drawn towards each other longing for union which was not approved by Shiva and Parvati. However, they were ordained to be born on earth as man and woman and marry. Accordingly, Kanjanan was born as Padmadhwaja, the prince of Puskara kingdom, and Chandrakanti was born as Sashirekha, the daughter of the king of Indubatipur.
Gradually Padmadhwaja and Sashirekha emerge as hero and heroine and the rest of the kavya is devoted to the description of their youth,romance, separation, marriage and wedded life. This particular piece of kavya is characterised, as per the characteristics of the age, by intricate rhyme-patterns, jugglery of words and interwoven metaphors,sparkling narration of youthful romance, the vivid, suggestive and overwhelming erotic descriptions and,above all, the display of human yearning for feminine beauty which make it lively and interesting.
Besides,the flashes of various social scenes as well as minute events from the social life, descriptions of different seasons, the vision of unsurpassed beauty, idicating the warm and romantic experiences of the pair of lovers help to give the work meaning and relevance at more than one level and make the kavya a representative literary product of the medieval odia literature and the royal poet Padmanabh, by his literary practice, a distinguished poet in the feudal line.
Odia Books By Padmanabh Srichandan
Padmanabh
Paramananda Acharya was born in 1891,He was a great scholar in history, archaeology and in the study of Archives. He combined his historical insight and perception with his literary abilities to produce monumental works on the history, archaeology and literature of odisha. After his education in a village school he studied at Amarada M.E. School and ultimately passed B.Sc. in 1933 from St. Xavier’s College, Calcutta. He worked with Ramaprasad Chandra in the Archaeological Survey of Mayurbhanj and Kahiching. Later on in 1934, he accompanied the prince of Mayurbhanj to England.
While in England he studied the ancient inscriptions including those of Chandrika Devi in Royal Asiatic Society. He attracted public attention when he published his study on the inscription of Ananta Basudev temple. He was appointed by the odisha Government as Superintendent of Archaeological Department in 1950 and with a record achievement to his credit in the field of historical study of odisha, he retired from Government service in 1958. For his outstanding contributions in the historical and literary field he was awarded Padmashri by the Government of India in 1964.
His literary works include hundreds of articles on the medieval poets of odisha and research papers on the history of odisha. His publication Radhanatharke Ananya Prativa (The super talent of the poet Radhanath, the pioneer of modern odia literature) brought him instant appreciation in the literary circles of odisha. His translation of Mr. Mottee’s Travel Account into odia as Sambalpur Yatra is one of the important publications. His studies in the history, archaeology and archives of odisha established him as a pioneering scholar in the fields. Besides, at times he wrote short stories in odia journals.
Odia Books By Paramananda Acharya
Radhanatharke Ananya Prativa
Gourishankar Ray was born in 1838 ,in a Bengali family at Dikshitpara in the district of Cuttack. After receiving informal education in Oriya, Urdu and Persian in his native village, he came to Cuttack for studies, whereafter he joined a college at Hoogly for higher studies. He returned to Odisha, joined the Commissioner’s Office, Cuttack, as a clerk, and later rose to be a ‘translator’ in the Cuttack Collectorate.With the help of a few friends he set up the Cuttack Printing Company and started editing Utkal deepika, a weekly newspaper, for the benefit of the people of Odisha.
He was associated with the paper for more than half a century, and is regarded as the father of journalism in Odisha. Utkal deepika became the centre of socio-cultural and political activities in the state. A good number of classical and puranic literature in Odisha,written on palm leaf, was decaying. He collected the material and got it printed with correct reading and notes.
He was a great lover of music and ancient literature of Odishaand made the colloquial language a
powerful vehicle of expression and evolved an effective prose style through his editorials.Besides, the ancient Odiya poems edited by him with suitable notes speak of his literary merit. One of the builders of modern Odisha, he ushered in the dawn of a new era through his dedication and ceaseless efforts for half a century.He wrote some bibliography A.C. Satpathy, Matru gourab (1933); Mrutunjoy Ratha, Karmayogi Gourishankar (1925); Nagendra Kumar Rai, Karmi Gourishankar (Cuttack, 1956); Radhanath Rath, Karmavir Gouri Shankar Roy (Satyabadi Press, 1980).
Odia Books By Gourishankar Ray
Utkal Deepika
Benudhar Raut born in 1925 in the village of Harichandanpur in Keonjhar district. He did his
M.A. in Odiya in 1949 from the Utkal University and joined a Government College as lecturer in Odiya.
Benudhar has written primarily poetry, but he has also to his credit a number of articles on art and literature which appeared in different periodicals from time to time.
As a poet he is basically an experimentalist and has tried diverse techniques. Unlike many of his contemporaries, he does not blindly imitate the new poets of the West. He believes that problems and their solutions in the east and in the west cannot be the same and they call for totally different approaches. Benudhar does not try to imitate a technique which does not suit the subject. He often seeks to modify the technique to suit his need. His poetical works include Pingalar surya (1967). He also wrote some essays which, though few in number, testify to the clarity and originality of his thought.
Odia Books By Benudhar Raut
Pingalar surya
Sri Chandana Partha author of Kalabati was a vassal chief of Banapura and son of a medieval Odiya poet, named Padmanabha Narendra. Kalabati, named after its heroine, is a narrative poem in seven cantos and deals with the story of her love for the Prince of Madhubana, their union, estrangement and reunion through the intervention of supernatural forces. The story is simple and conceived, on the whole, in the puranic style, and though at times it borders on monotony, the treatment of love in separation has some poignancy and makes a direct appeal to the heart.
Odia Books By Sri Chandana Partha
Kalabati
Bhima Dhibara A is famous in odia literature for his kavya Kapatapasha. From the surname Dhibara it
can be surmised that the poet was a ‘Dhibara’ or fisherman by caste. The poem was written most probably in the 17th century. It is divided into 10 cantos, each in different metres, such as, Nalini Gouda, Bangalashri,etc. The poet possibly because of his low-caste origin does not make any pretension of great learning. His use of simple idiomatic language to express deep emotions in popular melodious metres, has made the poem popular all over the state among all sections of people.
Although the poem is named Kapatapasha, i.e. the foul dice-game, it does not give an account of the
game. The poem begins dramatically from the scene in the court of the Kurus when Yudhishthira,
completely defeated In the game of dice, had lost everything including his brothers and his and their wife. The poet then proceeds to describe the humiliation of Draupadi, at the hands of Dushasana, which however brought immediate retribution.
It so happened that when on Duryodhana’s orders, Dushasana was trying to undress Draupadi, whose appeals for help evoked no response from the Kuru-elders, the clothes of Bhanumati, Duryodhana’s wife, caught fire, forcing her to come into the Kuru-court completely naked. Duryodhana and his friends were thus shamed into realisation that grievous wrong was being done to Draupadi. Duryodhana thereupon asked Duhsasana to stop.
The poet in order to teach the Kurus a lesson has quoted a line from the Bhagavata: ‘He who makes evil plans against others, himself suffers from the same, inviting God’s wrath.’ The story is taken from the odia epic Mahabharata of Sarala Das.The poet within the small compass of only 10 cantos has depicted the characters of Duryodhana,Duhsasana, Dhritarashtra, Drona, the five Pandava brothers and Draupadi in a beautiful manner. The dialogues and the activities of the different characters, although given very briefly, are effective in bringing their characters and attitudes into sharp focus.
The poet has stressed the glory of Shri Krishna who had helped Draupadi in her distress. Though he was a contemporary of the poets of the Riti school, Bhima Dhibara has not used any traditional rhetorical devices.
Odia Books By Bhima Dhibara
Kapatapasha
Gopalballav Das was born in 1860,He was the younger brother of Utkal Gaurab Madhusudan Das, one of the patriots and founders of the modern State of Orissa. His father was Raghunath Das and mother, Parvati Devi. Having passed M.A. examination from Calcutta University, he was appointed a Deputy Magistrate by the Government, the most covetable job for any Indian in those days under the English ruler. When the minor king of Keonjhar was installed on the thronej Gopalballav Das worked as superintedent of that State.
It was during his stay at Keonjhar that he came in contact with the tribal communities and wrote his only and now available novel Bhima Bhuniya. If not for anything else. Gopalballav Das is well remembered for this novel alone.
By temperament he was a traditionalist. He wrote poetical works like Usha, Taraksamhar and Konark
and he is credited with the composition of several lyrics. The odia novel as a literary phenomenon was a thing of the closing years of the nineteenth century and of the beginning of the twentieth.
The novel in the proper sense was introduced by Fakirmohan Senapati towards the close of the nineteenth century and Gopalballav Das was one among those who practised the art of writing novels and in the process he wrote the novel Bhima Bhuniya (written in 1896 and first published in Sept. 1908 from Edward Press, Cuttack) which has a unique theme in that it is based on the life and society of the Bhuniyas of Keonjhar.
Bhuniyas are the primitive tribe living in the region surrounded by dense forests and mountains. Through the ages these primitive people are known for their simple and unsophisticated way of life, their adherence to tradition and heritage, their loyalty and commitment to the village community system, their marriage system, the sense of chastity of their woman, their love for adventure and romance.
Such a theme whether real or imaginary, served only as a large canvas on which this novelist could depict the social and romance-oriented life of two Bhuniya youths. In a Bhuniya village, Sadhu Sardar had two sons Banasura and Bhima and in the same locality there was Til Sardar whose only darling daughter Chinamali was attracted towards both Banasura and Bhima.
Ultimately Chinamali was given in marriage to the elder brother Banasura according to the decision of both the parents. The development in the plot strikes a note of conflict in which agony-driven Bhima leaves his village and despite his father’s desire joins the court of Raja Jagadeva in the company of Sri Chandrasekhar Pattanaik, the Palace manager. There developed at this time anarchy and oppression in the principality, and in the royal conflict Bhima fell from the favour of the Raja and fled to the Marda Raja’s principality and was able to draw the attention of the Marda Raja.
Chandrasekhar Pattanaik also joined him there. A fierce battle took place between Raja Jagadeva and Raja Harichandan, the Marda Raj. In the fight Raja Jagadeva was miserably defeated at the hands of Bhima who demonstrated extra-ordinary valour in the fight.Bhima for his courage is rewarded with the title ‘Ranjit’ and each victorious soldier was to kill five prisoners of war. To Bhima’s lot also there were five priosoners including his father and brother. In such a situation, Bhima was confronted with a mental conflict.
But Bhima later on managed to collect two heads and this design escaped the notice of the Raja, who subsequently fell ill and all efforts to cure him were of no avail. At this critical juncture, Bhima managed to get the Raja treated by his father and the Raja was cured. The Raja now praised the old man not knowing that he was the father of Bhima. He honoured the old man with some valuable gifts and, when the royal servant proceeded to present the royal honour to the old man.
The king at once recognised the identity of Bhima and his father. Having, come to know of this secret design, the Raja flew into a rage and ordered that the life of the old man be spared as he had cured the Raja but, one of the two sons of the old man that is, Banasura and Bhima would be killed and the choice was to be indicated by the father. The old father was caught in a severe mental conflict as to Which son he would sacrifice. Unable to indicate his choice he only wept and soon fell unconscious. At this Bhima himself offered his head and bravely proceeded toward the executioner.
In this tense situation of pathos and agony the daughter of the Raja who was previously enamoured of Bhima appeared on the scene and implored her father to spare the life of Bhima and her wish was granted. Bhima was thus saved. The next development in the theme is marked by mutual attraction of romance and love between the daughter of the Raja and Bhima,which never saw fulfilment.
Both the princess and Bhima chose to remain in isolation and pursue a life of sublimation of passion and love. Bhima lived in Brindaban. Years after they met each other but their love was marked by pathos and agony. The princess has emerged as a remarkably gracious, virtuous, noble soul inspired by ideals of chastity, womanhood and sacrifice, projecting a tragic vision of love.
The theme in the novel is a kind of idealistic romanticised love. The prose is overladden with Sanskrit words, difficult phrases and proverbs. The style is ornamental, pedantic and tense. The author is more interested in holding up the social customs, belief and brave qualities of the Bhuniya tribe.
Odia Books By Gopalballav Das
Usha
Taraksamhar
Konark
Bibhuti Pattnaik is a prolific writer of novels and short stories, teaches Odia literature and language in a college. The locale of his novels varies from the rural landscape to the royal palace or to the centres of modern civilization, their popularity depending mainly upon the romantic appeal. The prominent theme of his novels is often a deep emotional man-woman relationship, and varied experiences of love contribute to the intense fervour in his novels.
In every novel a tangled knot of human relationships is presented, exposing the various facets of human character, and he, adept in feminine characterization, explores the mind of woman to show her in various shades of light. Women characters like Nirupama represent the traditional Indian womanhood, whereas at the other extreme one finds Pratima Chaudhuri and Sushama representing a type of modern woman born of the new civilization in all its perversion of values.
This obsession with the false values of a philistine civilization develops morbidity syndromes, and it is
reflected in individual life. The theme is movingly treated in Keshabati kanya, Ei ma ei mati” Ei mana
brindabana and in many other novels. The novelist lambasts these values in Naikara nama shrabani where
Chaudhuri frenziedly runs after money and the traditional family life disintegrates. In characterization, Bibhuti Pattanayak focuses on the extremes in which human nature can live.
Chapalachanda based on the background of Praja Andolan (People’s Movement) in the princely states of Odisha exposes Bairiganjana, the ruler of Andharigada, a sadist and sex maniac and his Dewan, Bishweshwara Pattanayak who is perverted and avaricious. At the other extreme there is Shuryamaji, the harbinger of a new consciousness, the chivalric ideal. Then there is Muktamala, the queen, a moving study in feminine jealousy and sacrifice. Besides the romantic, the, novelist deals with various other themes as well. They include the feudal tyranny in Chapalachanda and the molestation of innocent village life by forces of new civiliza.
Odia Books By Bibhuti Pattnaik
Naikara Nama Shrabani
Andharigada
Chapalachanda
Premika
Chai Leutani Bela
Dhulighara
Adina Barsha
