Beauty of Kannada

By seeing the Kannadigas’ plight to get the ‘Classical tag’ to Kannada, I wonder why the Government of India is still adamant of not going through with the decision of giving the classical status. Kannada is the most beautiful language I have ever come across, even better than my mother tongue, Telugu. It is not so surprising that Kannada has won the highest number of Jnanpith awards, which are the pinnacles of excellence achieved in Indian literature. This is an incredible feat of a language considering the fact that there are over 10 major languages in India. It is even more surprising that the Jnanpith awardees in Kannada, majority, are non- Kannadigas. Five of the seven are non-Kannadigas. It is interesting to understand the influence of the language which derived its roots as early as 230 BC. The script is more beautiful with most letters of the language being circular, which gives the script the symmetry and I vaguely remember my high school teacher saying it was voted the most beautiful script in the world sometime. The script is used by 3 other languages: Tulu, Kodava, Konkani, apart from itself. It is astonishing to know that the first Kannada –English dictionary was composed by Ferdinand Kittel, a German Priest. The transition from classical or the old Kannada (hale Kannada) to the present-day Kannada is of the demographical and has an historical significance. The invaders and the rulers had additions to the language and which can be clearly noticed in the language. Finally, with the current day additions to the language, mainly slangs, the classical Kannada has been reduced to something which has lost its stature. The beauty of the language lies in its ease of transformation and learning. I hope more people coming in to Karnataka, would learn the language, not because of some radical Kannada group's threats, but because of the beauty of the language. Wish I knew how to post this blog in Kannada. Proud to be a Kannadiga. :-)

Humble Beginnings

Like any other person's biography or autobiography contains an exclusive first chapter titled Humble Beginnings, I start my blog writing. And like any other forum to express personal opinions, whatever I write and express are my own views. I intend to discuss political and diplomatic issues. I have always thought that politics spans across many disciplines, let alone a region’s politics. I welcome comments, insight, and feedback by all the visitors to my blog. I am not much of a writer, but I read a lot. I will try and post a new article at least one every week. Keep blogging.

Testing :D

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Rajesh