Ganjam pundit translates Baideheesha Bilasa into Sanskrit

Author (Fourth from right) is showing his book to audiences

BHUBANESWAR: Pundit Bhagabata Prasad Dash Sharma, a retired Sanskrit teacher of Sorada in Ganjam district, has translated Baideheesha Bilasa, one of the toughest and pioneer Odia poetry books of Kabi Samrat Upendra Bhanja, into Sanskrit.

Bhanja, a poet of unsurpassed rhetorical excellence, had written the Baideheesha Bilasa during the Seventeen century. The poetry, which is based on the epic Ramayana, is a magnificent piece of work where every word of the line of a poem is started with Odia alphabet ‘Ba’.  

The profound use of ornamental languages and poetic devices like alliteration, simile, metaphor, hyperbole, allegory, symbols and images had made the poetry tough for other contemporary poets and successors, but Dash Sharma translated it into the ancient language Sanskrit. Though it was a Herculean task, Dash Sharma did it and tried to give justice to the original one.

“I’m happy after translating the great work of Bhanja, who belongs to my area. His village Kullada of Bhanjanagar area is only 38 km from my place,” said Dash Sharma, adding, “I dedicate my work to the great poet of all time.”

The pundit took 25 years to complete the translation, which has 113 Chhandas (poetic meters). The translated version has two parts, Purva Bilasa and Uttar Bilasa, for readers’ convenience. The Purva Bilasa consists of 534 pages having 1,241 slokas while the Uttar Bilasa has 1,459 slokas in 625 pages.    

Dash Sharma has been awarded with the Bidyaratna Pratibha Samman and Sashibhushan Pratibha Samman and felicitated by various quarters. His another work Sashibhusan Charitam, which was published by the Rashtriya Sanskrit Sansthan, New Delhi, is distributed among 100 universities of the country. 

The Sanskrit Baideheesha Bilasa was released on the occasion of State-level Sanskrit Day celebration organised by the Utkal Sanskruta Shikshak Mahasangh here on Saturday. The function was attended by School and Mass Education Minister Debi Prasad Mishra, Law Minister Arun Sahu, noted pundit Prabodh Kumar Mishra and hundreds of Sanskrit teachers.      

Landless freedom fighter yet to get land from State

BHUBANESWAR: A man, who helped us get our motherland back from tyrant Englishmen and spent horrible moments in jails with a smile, is now running from pillar to post to get a small piece of land under the freedom fighter quota from the State Government.

Born in 1921 at Kesharpur village of Kendrapada district, freedom fighter Sukadev Sahu is in the last stage of his life. Inspired by the patriotic speeches, he had joined the freedom movement in 1941 and was arrested during the movement. He had spent many days in the jail and the rest is history.

Das, a landless freedom fighter, had requested the President of India in 2010 to provide a piece of land. The President’s office had communicated the letter to the Union Home Ministry and directed to take appropriate action at their end. The Ministry on February 11, 2010, wrote to the Chief Secretary of Odisha to process the request.

On May 26, 2010, the Revenue and Disaster Management department had written a letter to the District Collector, Khordha to take appropriate action as per rule. Even the department had sent a copy of the letter to Sahu as directed by the Union Home Ministry.

Four years have already passed, but the Khordha Collector is yet to give any response in the matter. “The Collector is sitting over the file during these years without taking any action on the letter,” said Sahu’s son Satyanarayan.

The freedom fighter’s son said his father has already given five letters to the Collector to look into the matter, but they don’t get any response. “My father has all the valid documents including citations and identity cards given by the Centre and the State. The President, the Union Home Ministry and the State Government had directed the Collector to process my father’s request, but no action has been taken into the matter,” said Satyanarayan, adding, “It seems the administration is indirectly neglecting us.”

He said the State Government has allotted several plots, flats and land in favour of corrupt politicians, bureaucrats, influential persons and their relatives, but it didn’t have time to process the letter of a freedom fighter.

India got freedom and the nation marched ahead with the times, but the country seldom thinks about the sacrifices of so many people participated in the movement. The country in general and the State in particular remember the names of the heroes only on the Independence Day by felicitating with citations, he lamented.

The story was published in The Pioneer English daily on August 14, 2014