The President of India’s Shreshta Bhasha Puraskaram for Malayalam awarded to VR Prabodhachandran Nayar (VRP) is a recognition for his contribution to the growth and development of this classic language of the South.
When VRP was born into a traditional family in North Paravur, his father, a Sanskrit scholar, was head master in the local high school. Naturally, the youngster was used to a literary ambience at home. The milieu of innumerable temples around, where programmes such as Kathakali and Koodiyattam were staged, instilled in him a love for vintage classical art forms and a liking for different languages.
Though he did Botany and Chemistry for his under-graduation, he was guided by the professor he happened to meet to opt for Malayalam for his post graduation. He finished the course with a first rank and also won Godavarma Memorial Gold Medal for his performance. In 1959, at the age of 20, he became a lecturer in Malayalam at the Hindu College in Nagercoil. He went on to do his PhD,based on a study of Cherusseri’s Krishnagatha.
Meanwhile, in May 1963 he joined the University’s newly-established Department of Linguistics as its one and only lecturer.
After submitting his PhD thesis on ‘Descriptive grammar of Krishnagatha ’, he won a British Commonwealth Scholarship for post-doctoral research that enabled him to do an additional PhD in the phonetics and phonology of Malayalam at the School of Oriental and African Studies in the University of London. He retired from service in 1998 while serving as the Chair Professor of the department.
While working as a lecturer in Linguistics, VRP took to writing and came out with books on phonology in Malayalam. Swanavijnanam (Phonetics) and Bhashasastra Nighantu (Dictionary of Linguistics) bear testimony to his untiring efforts to bring that branch of learning home to the inquisitive Malayali. He unveiled a whole new world of knowledge and experience that remained unknown and unapproachable so far.
VRP also dealt with translation, theory and practice in his books. The first of them was Vivarthanathinte Bhashasastra Bhumika (Linguistic Background to Translation). He also edited a collection of essays on translation, Vivarthana Chintakal (Thoughts on Translation). He proved himself to be a many-faceted connoisseur intent on reforming, enriching and serving his mother tongue in every conceivable way at the different levels at which it is used. A quick look at some of his works in Malayalam and English reveals the range and variety of the topics VRP has dealt with in his writings. There has been books on Dravidian and world languages, writing, phonology, phonetics, pronunciation, style, linguistics, psalms and Kathakali songs.
VRP says his work experience at different levels and at different educational centres all over India and abroad has given him the exposure he needed to the teaching methods and learning practices that prevailed in these places.
Meanwhile his stint at Kerala Kalamandalam as its chairman found him utilise the opportunity to improve the performance of the institution and strengthen it. VRP donated thousands of books from his personal collection to the Ezhuthachan Smaraka University of Tirur, where they are kept in the section, ‘Prabodhachandra Sekharam’.
VRP has also composed more than 600 musical pieces in Malayalam. Most of them have been set to music by B Pushpa Krishnan, former head, Department of Music, University of Kerala. These compositions, most of them devotional, come under four heads — classical, Kathakali music, Sopanam and light music. Besides writing reviews for The Hindu Friday Review, he presents programmes on television and radio. He has also guided researchers in modernising Malayalam at the levels of its script, vocabulary, syntax, stylistics and so on, making it more compatible for computers.
In short, VRP has endeavoured to blend linguistics as well as other subjects he has handled with art, anecdotes, poetry and a touch of humour to instruct, edify or entertain.
