A straight-spoken litterateur, Kalburgi had stirred controversy through his speeches and research articles.
By Raghavendra M
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The assassination of MM Kalburgi, a renowned Kannada scholar and former vice-chancellor of Hampi University, in the heartland of great poetry and classical music has stirred a nationwide debate in India.
Malleshappa Madivalappa Kalburgi, 76, was shot dead by two unidentified assailants in at his residence in Dharwad in north Karnataka on Sunday morning (August 30). Two youths, who claimed to be students, sought to meet him and later shot him dead at around 8.40 am on Sunday and managed to escape.
While the motive behind the murder is yet to be ascertained, the incident has shocked Karnataka and has evoked anger against the perpetrators behind the dreadful act. The issue trended on Twitter on Sunday and Monday with people blaming RSS and other right-wing organizations for the killing.
Human chain of peaceful protestors & supporters of slain rationalist writer MM #Kalburgi in Dharwar. pic.twitter.com/DZQqlGIUti
— Friends of Congress (@friendscongress) August 31, 2015
#BJP and Lingayat leader BS Yeddyurappa paying last respects to Prof #Kalburgi @htTweets pic.twitter.com/BJ9FdI8Q1i
— Sudipto Mondal (@mondalsudipto) August 31, 2015
Who Killed MM Kalburgi?
A straight-spoken litterateur, Kalburgi had stirred controversy through his speeches and research articles. Both his own Lingayat community leaders and seers and also Hindutva fringe was angry about his views.
In 1989 itself Dr Kalburgi had received threats to his life after on his research works contained a few controversial views on the life and relationships of Basavanna, a saint of from 12th century. Later, Kalburgi had to edit out the controversial portion from his book due to pressures from community seers. During that time, he continued his teaching at Karnatak University in Dharwad under police protection.
Hailing from a wealthy Lingayat family, Kalburgi held a leftist views and he often had angered the Hindu right-wing groups. Lingayat community, which is the single largest group in the Karnataka, dominates the politics here and is supportive of Bharatiya Janata Party.
After angering his own community, he also faced the wraths of Hindu devotees when he said that “Hindu idols will not take revenge if one urinated on them” A case was filed in this connection against Kalburgi and writer late UR Ananthamurthy for hurting religious sentiments.
Writing about this incident and how writers and free thinkers are subjected to threats, BBC mentioned the fate of Perumal Murugan, a well-known Tamil writer who decided to give up writing forever after there were wrathful protests against his novel.
Property dispute?
While the intellectuals and leftists are claiming that Hindu outfits are behind the assassination, a BJP spokesperson from Hubli-Dharwad has said that a family dispute lead to the murder.
However, Kalburgi’s daughter Roopadarshi dismissed this claim and said, “There was a threat to my father from groups that couldn’t digest his views on caste and communalism. The role of these groups should be probed”.
Legacy
An epigraphist and a winner of both state and Centre’s Sahitya Academy awards, MM Kalburgi has published more than 20 publications. This includes his four volumes of research papers – Marga I-IV and dozens of volumes of Vachana literature.
Even at the age of 76, he was still working on editing and publishing literature. According to senior journalist Shivanand Kanavi, Kalburgi was now engaged in editing a volume of over 2500 selected vachana poems to be published in 20 different languages. He supervised and guided the translators in different languages as well. As a result, in 2012 Kannada, Sanskrit, English, Urdu, Bengali, Hindi, Marathi, Telugu, Punjabi, Tamil editions were published by Basava Samiti.
“When I met him last week he assured me that the remaining 10 language editions in Dogri, Maithili, Assami, Bodo, Gujarati, Malayalam, Konkani, Nepali, Odiya, Santhali, Kashmiri and Sindhi are also in the final stage and would be published in the last quarter of this year. Translations into Mandarin, Japanese, French and Spanish were also on the cards”, Kanavi wrote in his blog.
While the reason behind this heinous act is yet to be investigated, the incident has caused a deep wound in the heart of Karnataka, the state that is known for its spiritual, musical and literary values.