KARNATAKA :
Bengaluru :
Award winning Kannada novelist Bolwar Mahamad Kunhi wants to write a novel on Prophet Muhammad’s young wife Aisha, who was among eleven wives of the prophet who married him at the age of eight.
Kuhni, who recently won Kendra Sahitya Academy Award for his novel Swathantrada Ota, was in conversation with critic M S Ashadevi at a session on ‘the return of the novel to Kannada literature’ at Times Literature Festival on Sunday. The discussion was moderated by writer Vikram Hatwar.
He said writing about Sita was easier than Aisha since the character of Sita and sacrifice she made was known to people whereas. “It is difficult to write about someone like Aisha and it is going to be demystifying myths about her,” said Kunhi. “It takes some more time before writing the novel. I am yet to get authentic data about her, and I am still researching,” he added.
Commenting on the politics over Ayodhya, the novelist said an issue was made out of Ram temple for a particular reason and Ayodhya was never been a pilgrimage centre unlike Kashi. “I find it odd when people go on pilgrimage to Ayodhya and Ram idol has been relegated to a corner there,” he said.
The issue of Ram temple came up in the discussion in the context that Kunhi has used Ramayana and the character of Ram as parallel to the main characters in his 1,100-page mega novel Swanthanthrada Ota.
Swathanthrada Ota was originally was a short story about two children coming to India from Pakistan during the Partition and Kunhi elaborated into a novel as he wanted to tell the saga of Partition that is relevant for many more years to come.
On the recent tendency of Kannada short story writers migrating to the novel genre, Asha Devi said the development has an historic significance and the tendency was being seen even in all other Indian languages. “It is not an accidental phenomenon. There is a historic significance to it. The writers have affinity to short story genre and gravitating towards novel. And it signifies the longing for returning to the roots and also quest for the remedy of social decadence,” she said.
Asha Devi observed that the short story genre is giving way to novel at a time when the writers are returning to find Mahatma Gandhi as their subject. She gave the instance of the novel Gandhi Banda by H Nagavni, while Kunhi’s Swathanthrada Ota revolves round Gandhi in the backdrop of the Partition.
source: http://www.timesofindia.indiatimes.com / The Times of India / News> City News> Bangalore News / by B V Shiva Shankar / TNN / February 12th, 2017
