Gautam Sharma "Vyathit"

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Gautam Sharma "Vyathit" (born on 15 August 1938; born Gautam Chand Sharma), is a folklorist, playwright, and poet from Himachal Pradesh, India. He is also known as Gautam Chand Sharma "Vyathit" or just Gautam Vyathit. He is noted for his literary works in Dogri and Hindi, as well as for his various efforts to preserve and nurture the endangered folk arts of Himachal Pradesh, especially those of the Kangra region. Vyathit was the joint recipient of the 2007 Sahitya Akademi Award (Bhasha Samman) for his contributions to Himachali languages and literature. 'Vyathit', Gautam Sharma's pen-name in Hindi, means 'pained', or 'distressed'.

Contents

Personal life

Vyathit was born to Faquir Chand and Sheela Devi on 15 August 1938, at village Nerti in the Kangra district of erstwhile Punjab Province, British India. Nerti is now located in Kangra district, Himachal Pradesh, India. Vyathit did his primary schooling from Nerti, matriculation from the nearby village of Rait (1957), and B.A. (1965), B.Ed., and M.A. in Hindi (1968) from Punjab University. He ultimately earned a PhD in 1974, from the Guru Nanak Dev University in Punjab. His doctoral thesis was titled Literary evaluation and critical analysis of Kangri folk songs. He began his teaching career as a primary school teacher and proceeded to teach Hindi at Government College, Dharamshala for many years. Vyathit continues to live in Nerti. [1] [2] [3]

Works

Kangra Lok Sahitya Parishad

Vyathit has been the founder-director of the NGO 'Kangra Lok Sahitya Parishad' (translated as Kangra folk literature council), established at Nerti in 1973. [1] [2] This NGO works for documenting and promoting the endangered folk arts of Himachal Pradesh. Its activities have included surveying and documenting these arts, [4] [5] and organizing cultural events including poetry recitals, [6] [7] folk theatre, [8] folk dances, [9] festivals, [10] and publications. [11] [12] Vyathit has also developed an open-air theatre in Nerti, where the Parishad often hosts its activities. [1]

Works on Kangri folk arts

Vyathit's documentation and analyses of Kangra's folklore have been considered significant by scholars of disciplines including literature, anthropology, and folklore studies. These include Kirin Narayan, [13] [14] [15] and Alan Dundes, [16] besides others. [17] [18] Since the early 1970s, Vyathit has been known for re-choreographing Kangra's Jhamakara folk-dance, which earlier used to be performed by women during marriage festivities only behind closed doors, and promoting this dance as a public art form. [1] [9] Vyathit is known for revitalizing Kangra's traditional folk-theatre, infusing it with current themes and challenging traditional norms of participation in these plays. [8]

Poetry

Vyathit is widely considered a prominent poet from Himachal Pradesh. [17] [19] [20] [3] He writes in Dogri and Hindi. His poems revolve around rural life and nature in Kangra. Atma Ram notes that Vyathit expresses the 'vyatha' (suffering; from which the pen-name 'vyathit' is derived) of the common person in rural Kangra. [2]

Linguistics

Vyathit contributed the sections on Kangri and Hindi for the Himachal Pradesh volume of the People's Linguistic Survey of India. [21]

Others

Vyathit is a member of the Himachal Pradesh Brahmin Kalyan Board. [22] [23]

Recognition

Some among the numerous awards received by Vyathit are the following: [1] [2]

Select Bibliography

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Kangra district</span> District in Himachal Pradesh, India

Kangra district is the most populous district of the Indian state of Himachal Pradesh. Dharamshala is the administrative headquarters of the district.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Western Pahari</span> Language family of North India

The Western Pahari or Himachali languages are a range of languages and dialects of Northern Indo-Aryan languages spoken in the western parts of the Himalayan range, primarily in the state of Himachal Pradesh. They are also spoken in Jammu and Jaunsar-Bawar.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Dogri language</span> Indo-Aryan language spoken primarily in Jammu

Dogri is an Indo-Aryan language of the Western Pahari group, primarily spoken in the Jammu region of Jammu and Kashmir, India, with smaller groups of speakers in the adjoining regions of western Himachal Pradesh, northern Punjab, and north-eastern Pakistani Punjab. It is the ethnic language of the Dogras, and was spoken in the historical region of Duggar. It is currently spoken in the districts of Kathua, Jammu, Samba, Udhampur, Reasi and other adjoining districts of Jammu Province Unusually for an Indo-European language, Dogri is tonal, a trait it shares with other Western Pahari languages and Punjabi. It has several varieties, all with greater than 80% lexical similarity.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Kangri language</span> Language of northern India

The Kangri is a dialect of Punjabi of Indo-Aryan language that is spoken in northern India, predominantly in the Kangra, Una and Hamirpur of Himachal Pradesh, as well as in some parts of Mandi and Chamba districts of Himachal Pradesh and Gurdaspur, Rupnagar and Hoshiarpur districts of Punjab. Kangri language is also spoken in Duggar (Jammu region) and in a few villages of Pakistan by people from families that migrated from Kangra Valley. Kangri is associated with the people of the Kangra Valley. Its total number of speakers has been estimated at 1.1 million, as of 2011.

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References

  1. 1 2 3 4 5 Joshi, Sriniwas (12 April 2015). "Dr Vyathit is Dr Modest". Tribuneindia News Service. Retrieved 4 January 2023.
  2. 1 2 3 4 Ram, Atma (1995). Morality in Tess and Other Essays: In Honour of Mulk Raj Anand. Mittal Publications. pp. 81–83. ISBN   978-81-7099-610-1.
  3. 1 2 Dutt, K. C. (1999). Who's who of Indian Writers: 1999 : In 2 Vol. Vol. 1 A-M. Sahitya Akademi. p. 1193. ISBN   978-81-260-0873-5.
  4. ↑ "पारंपरिक विवाह व रीति-रिवाज के गीत सहेजेगी कांगड़ा लोक साहित्‍य परिषद Kangra News". Dainik Jagran (in Hindi). Retrieved 4 January 2023.
  5. ↑ "पारंपरिक लोक वाद्य एवं वादक विलुप्तता की कगार पर". khas khabar (in Hindi). 7 December 2016. Retrieved 4 January 2023.
  6. ↑ "त्रिगर्त उत्सव | जिला काँगड़ा, हिमाचल प्रदेश सरकार | भारत" (in Hindi). Retrieved 4 January 2023.
  7. ↑ "कांगड़ा की संस्कृति से रूबरू होंगे देश-विदेश के निवेशक". Amar Ujala (in Hindi). Retrieved 4 January 2023.
  8. 1 2 "Folk Theatre of Kangra". www.123himachal.com. Retrieved 4 January 2023.
  9. 1 2 ChandraKanta. "Jhamakada Folk Dance Of Kangra झमाकड़ा - काँगड़ा का लोक नृत्य". गजगामिनी. Retrieved 4 January 2023.
  10. ↑ Jeratha, Aśoka (1998). Dogra Legends of Art & Culture. Indus Publishing. p. 47. ISBN   978-81-7387-082-8.
  11. ↑ Phull, Sushil Kumar (1978). "Hindi Short Story in Himachal". Indian Literature. 21 (1): 33–40. ISSN   0019-5804. JSTOR   23333170.
  12. ↑ Rahi, Javaid. The Gujjars -Vol 04 (Gujjars History & Culture) by Dr. Javaid Rahi. Jammu and Kashmir Acacademy of Art, Culture , Languages , Jammu.
  13. ↑ Narayan, Kirin (1995). "The Practice of Oral Literary Criticism: Women's Songs in Kangra, India". The Journal of American Folklore. 108 (429): 243–264. doi:10.2307/541878. hdl: 1885/100198 . ISSN   0021-8715. JSTOR   541878.
  14. ↑ Narayan, Kirin; Sood, Urmila Devi (1997). Mondays on the Dark Night of the Moon: Himalayan Foothill Folktales. Oxford University Press. ISBN   978-0-19-510348-9.
  15. ↑ Narayan, Kirin (22 November 2016). Everyday Creativity: Singing Goddesses in the Himalayan Foothills. University of Chicago Press. ISBN   978-0-226-40756-2.
  16. ↑ Dundes, Alan (1996). The Walled-up Wife: A Casebook. University of Wisconsin Press. p. 113. ISBN   978-0-299-15070-9.
  17. 1 2 Das, Sisir Kumar (2005). A History of Indian Literature: 1911-1956, struggle for freedom : triumph and tragedy. Sahitya Akademi. p. 702. ISBN   978-81-7201-798-9.
  18. ↑ Lavie, Smadar; Swedenburg, Ted (22 July 2013). Displacement, Diaspora, and Geographies of Identity. Duke University Press. ISBN   978-0-8223-7957-7.
  19. ↑ George, K. M. (1992). Modern Indian Literature, an Anthology: Surveys and poems. Sahitya Akademi. p. 103. ISBN   978-81-7201-324-0.
  20. ↑ Datta, Amaresh (1988). Encyclopaedia of Indian Literature: Devraj to Jyoti. Sahitya Akademi. p. 1601. ISBN   978-81-260-1194-0.
  21. ↑ "PLSI Contributors". bhasha.frappe.cloud. Retrieved 4 January 2023.
  22. ↑ "List of Members of H.P. Brahmin Kalyan Board" (PDF).
  23. ↑ "CM announces Makar Sakranti of Brijeshwari Dham as District Level Festival".
  24. ↑ "Sahitya Academy - List of Bhasha Samman Awardees" (PDF).
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