Chandan Gowda: The humanism of Siddalingaiah (1954-2021)

By Dilip -

Poet, folklorist, orator, teacher, legislator, administrator and co-founder of the Dalit movement in Karnataka, Siddalingaiah’s many-layered engagement with the life of the state defies easy characterisation. Indispensable for a historian of contemporary morality in Karnataka, Siddalingaiah’s work is an elaboration of a rich vision of humanism. His debut book of poetry, Holey-Maadigara Haadu (The Song of the Holeyas and Maadigas, 1975) expressed the suffering of Dalits with a fury and imagery hitherto unknown in modern Kannada poetry. 


Due to an early attraction to the class analyses of Marxism, his poetic focus though was not solely fixed on the Dalit experience. The famous poem from his debut anthology, Nanna Janagalu (My People), for instance, articulated the experience of several kinds of toiling labourers without referring to their community identities….

https://www.deccanherald.com/opinion/the-humanism-of-siddalingaiah-1004625.html


Two excerpts from Avataragulu

‘Avataragalu’ turns 35

Laughing at the Gods

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