Mahopadhyaya Sankhyayana Sarma

B. RAJABHUSHANA RAO
Advocate, Hyderabad

Sri Mahopadhyaya Achanta Venkataraya Sankhyayana Sarma, whose bIrth centenary the State of Andhra Pradesh recently celebrated, was a phenomenon among his elders and the stalwarts of the Victorian era. Born to affluence, but never given to indolence, he was a boy that arrested everybody’s attention and could not steal by the crowd even if he would. He passed with distinction and stood first at the Middle School Examination, held for the whole of the multi-lingual area of Madras Presidency as it then was. This educational qualification of his was more than sufficient to enable him to enter the legal profession which was held in high esteem in those days. But his intellect and temperament were such that they would not allow him to put on blinkers and run in a rut. What with his passion for literature–Sanskrit, Telugu, and English, what with his love of the histrionic art and the theatre and of fine arts like music, what with his keen interest in almost all branches of science, what with the numerous facets of his mind that not merely shone but scintillated, he would not be cribbed and confined to any set pattern of intellectual activity. In his teens, he attained by his own self-effort striking mastery of Sanskrit and Telugu. When he was barely seventeen, he started a journal called Sujana Promodini which was his first literary debut, and which he edited for two years. Encouraged by his friends, he performed at the age of twenty his first Satavadhanam, an impromptu literary performance much in vogue in the Andhra country and requiring display of one's memory, extempore versification, and alertness of mind. In the same year, he brought out his first literary production entitled Sudhanidhiwhich is regarded as the first book of Modern Telugu poetry. Though cast in the classical mould, it cut new ground in the literary field, in that his descriptions of all and sundry in it breathed an air of freshness and did not conform to the conventional type. He openly expressed that his muse could not be put in a straight jacket, and he proved to be a pioneer for later writers, who demanded and exercised freedom from what they thought was the tyranny of the classical grammar and literary criticism. However he did not go the whole hog with them, though to a large extent he broke away from the cult of the turgid and factitious style. On the other hand, with his scientific approach to everything, he was an exponent of the use of the mot juste and the language that expressed all the nuances of thought.

Even by his first public appearance in the literary arena, he emerged not as a novice but as a master, not as a seeker but as an authority, among the litterateurs of his time. He had no need to pass through the usual phases of apprenticeship and probation. With his impressive lineaments and imposing intellect, with his capacious mind that earned him the name of a walking encyclopaedia with his clarity and alacrity of intellect and with his powers of quick repartee coupled with genial humour, he easily dominated and captivated any literary gathering that he attended. His was a masterful personality, and when he spoke, he held the audience in his palm. It was no wonder that his knowledge that was at once deep, varied and expansive evoked glowing tributes from contemporary leaders of thought in various fields. He lived at a time when one of the passions of the Andhra writers was to bring the Andhra public in touch with the treasures of Sanskrit literature, and if he translated in running prose Bhavabhuti’s Uttara Rama Charitram, a masterpiece of pathos and brought out in Telugu Kalidas’s Vikramorvasiyamconceived and depicted in a classical setting, it was because Mr. Sarma was moved by a similar desire to serve the Andhra people. He also produced original works, a social drama entitled Manoramahaving for its theme a type of sub-communal wrangle rampant in his days Partha Parajayam an unpublished work, Avadata Kalabhakam adapted from Buddhistic literature Utsrishtikarnama species of drama poignantly pathetic, Rahasya Darpanam and Andhra Padyavali. He founded a journal known as Kalpalata, which dealt, as its name indicated, with almost every subject under the sun, including politics, which no journal had by then ever thought of touching upon. To mention that he was its editor is an understatement. Except a negligible portion, almost every column of it contained only his contribution. He wrote seriously as well as in a lighter vein and his originality and spirit of research were reflected in it. He was the first scholar thattold the Andhras that, besides Srinadha, another poet Mukkavalli Venkayya had fully translated the Naishadha Kavyam of Sri harsha, and cited verses from the translation. The journal posed certain literary questions and puzzles, and prizes for the best answers were awarded in the order of merit. It was this feature of it in particular that made it a meeting ground and common platform for many a literary aspirant. One of the lifelong unions between two different writers, then widely separated in several respects, but later well-known as literary twinsby the name of Venkataparvateeswara Kavulu or poets was brought about by this journal. Nataka Sarvasvam, an unpublished work of his, was hailed by leading men of letters that came across it and are still fortunately with us as a unique and invaluable contribution to the scienceof literary criticism particularly of the drama.

He presided over many literary conferences and delivered thoughtful and thought-provoking addresses which were mostly extempore. Special mention must however be made of his Presidential Address at Tanuku at the 13th session of the Andhra Sahitya Parishat in 1924. It discussed some of the fundamental aspects of the origin and the growth of the Andhra language and literature and was assessed as one of the classics of Telugu. One must also mention that a controversy, which had been raging in the Andhra country for many years over the use of the colloquial or the grammatical expression in literary works, reached its climax at this session and threatened to create a permanent and unbridgeable chasm between the two schools of thought. It was the genuine and the innate tact of Mr. Sarma that averted what might have otherwise turned out to be a cultural disaster for the Andhras. He had the ability to silence opposition without rousing passions. Even if he often smashed an interruption by his powerful retort, he immediately rounded it off by a humorous observation that left behind no trail of bitterness. In recognition of his prodigious knowledge and talents, the popular title of Mahopadhyaya was conferred on him at the sixth session of the Sarasvata Conference at Tenali. Some of his extempore verses, which were not however recorded, gained large currency. He was also a patron of the stage, and he actively participated in founding the Andhra Nataka Kala Parishad and presided over its first conference at Tenali.

His literary and artistic performances and achievements art but an expression of a tiny fragment of his all round personality. Essentially, he was of a scientific bent of mind, and given adequate opportunities for the full play of his scientific faculties and researches, he would have been one of the top ranking scientists of his day. He believed and wrote for the benefit of the layman on scientific subjects, avoiding almost completely the use of the technical diction. He was thus the forerunner of the later movements and trials for bringing out scientific works in the vernacular languages. He was also reported to have made bold predictions which later materialised in the shape of scientific inventions. Unlike most of the religious conservatives of the West or the traditional scholars of the East, he not only accepted the Darwinian theory of evolution and the origin of the species but made further speculations on its basis. One of the favourite branches of his scientific study was Geology. Some of the schemes for mining which he took up and executed as the Diwan of Chinamerangi Estate brought him into touch with foreign experts, who took him for a professional engineer. None the less, some of the projects which he planned and tried to implement were more worthy of a cabinet minister of an independent State than of a Diwan of a small estate with limited resources. His imagination often outrunning his caution, he landed himself and his Zamindar in financial difficulties.

He was a centre of attraction to his contemporaries interested in culture and knowledge. He was holding what might be called a literary Darbar, a word that came to be associated afterwards with the late Sri Mutnuri Krishnarao, the illustrious editor of the Andhra Weekly known as Krishna Patrika. Some of his colleagues and admirers, who had intimate contact with him, are still available to tell us anecdotes in illustration of his ready wit, his catching sense of humour, his bewitching powers of conversation, his skill as a debator and speaker, and in short, of every aspect of his complete personality. To give but one instance, one can recall an election meeting which he was addressing as a young candidate opposing two influential rivals of established reputation, each of whom however was lame. When a member of the audience interrupted him and asked why he was standing against such powerful opponents, he retorted without a moment’s hesitation by asking, why when lame men were standing he should not stand having both his legs in tact. He was as conscious of his own abilities as he was proud of the historical and cultural importance of the Andhras and of the great cultural heritage and destiny of India, which he never failed to stress whenever occasion arose. It is also said that his heart was as large as his head and that he was generous to a fault to his servants and dependents. He had and still has many Boswells, none of whom however has written his biography. It is gratifying to find that the State of Andhra Pradesh which fittingly celebrated his birth centenary is also taking steps to gather and consolidate all the instructive and interesting incidents about him, of which no written record has been left to us and entrusted the task of publishing his biography to Sri Nidadavolu Venkata Rao. Efforts are also being made to see that his unpublished works like Nataka sarvasvam are traced and preserved, and his works are published and made accessible to the Andhra public. Such a publication would be one of the best memorials to the late Sri Mahopadhyaya Venkataraya Sankhyayana Sarma, to whom the Andhras owe a debt of gratitude.