The ambitious project of the Department of Kannada and Culture, to make available classic works of Kannada free, through an agreement with DailyHunt (NewsHunt), a developer of apps, is getting overwhelming response.
According to K.A. Dayanand, Director, Department of Kannada and Culture, over 500 works in Kannada are now available for browsing, download and reading of the collection of works brought out by the government in recent years.
What’s popular
“Over 12 lakh readers have downloaded various works from the mobile app. Around 5 lakh readers have downloaded Kaviraja Marga Mattu Kannada Jagattu (published in 2000) by Magsaysay award recipient, writer and theatre personality, K.V. Subbanna, so far,” he said.
The work is on Kaviraja Marga, the earliest available work on poetics and grammar in Kannada language by Rashtrakuta king Nrupatunga Amoghavarsha.
Readers are also downloading special volumes brought out by department such as Glimpses of Karnataka , Jewels of Administration , Karnataka Kaipidi , Karnatakada Minugunota , and A Hand Book of Karnataka .
‘Kannadasiri’
Besides the mobile app, the Kannadasiri website is getting enriched with content such as Vachana sahitya , Dasa Sahitya , Kagga Sanchaya , which also give people an option of listening to the works set to music.
The Kannada Book Authority (KBA) had published Vachanas in 15 volumes and of this, 21,674 Vachanas from 249 Vachanakaras were selected and uploaded in kannadasiri.com.
The website contains 16,000 Keertanas of Dasa Sahitya Sanchaya of 190 Keerthanakaras. Over 945 poems of Mankuthimmana Kagga by noted litterateur D.V. Gundappa has also been uploaded.
More plans
“We are planning to upload another 500 to 1,000 classics in the form of e-books on the website,” he said.
Kannadasiri website will have content such as Vachana sahitya, where works are set to music
