Odia Books

Kalindicharan Panigrahi was born in 1901. He is an eminent poet; novelist and essayist and one of the leading members of the Sabuja movement, graduated from Ravenshaw College. He served as an officer in the cooperative department for some time, and later edited Bhanja pradipa from Baripada, Mayurbhanj. In the beginning he used to write poems and short stories in Utkal sahitya and Sahakar, two outstanding journals of the day. He was also one of the co-authors of Basanti, a novel written by a group of writers. Bhakta kabi Madhusudan, a critical biography of a nineteenth century poet, was his first published book. In 1931, with his friends of the Sabuja group, he published an anthology called Sabuja kabita which presented some outstanding poems of the period. His novel, Matira manisa (1931) written in a fluent colloquial style and permeated with Gandhian idealism, became popular. Besides this, he wrote Muktagadara kshudha (The hunger of Muktagarh, 1932), Amara chita (The pyre immortal, 1933), Luhara manisa (Iron man, 1947) and Ajira manisa (Today’s man). The first two depict the 1866 famine against the contemporary setting. The last two are the continuation of the earlier novel Matira manisa. His short story collections such as Sagarika(Lady of the sea), Dwadashi (Twelve stories), Shesharashmi (Last rays), Rashiphala (Astrological predictions) and Mokathati sarinahim (My tale is not yet over) are unique in their field. The story‘Mansara bilapa’ depicts the unending love and friendship of two animals, a grey hound and a deer, with deep pathos.

Kalindicharan is also noted for his essays in criticism, found in works like Netritwa 0 netritwa (1949) and
Sahitika He also wrote Ange yaha nibhaichi (1973), his autobiography. His contribution in the field of poetry is quite commendable. The collections are Manenahim (Not remembered, 1947), Mahadipa (Great lamp, 1948), Kshanika satya (Transient truth, 1949), Chhuritie loda (A knife is needed, 1950) and Mo kabita (My poems, 1950). The first three collections contain poems of sensuous beauty, romantic love and youthful joy, and other collections have poems on various problems of society. In the poem ‘Agami’ (The future, 1942) he tells us that his future poetry would be about a society where everybody should have a room to live in and a standard meal to eat. This realistic outlook is depicted in many of the poems· of Chhuritie loda and Mo kabita. Hence in the later period Kalindicharan is no longer green in his outlook and copes with the burning problems of life and society. ‘Mirza miya riksa tane’ (Mirza Mian pulls rikshaw) is an example of his love for the downtrodden.

Ange Jaha Nibhaichi
Mo Kabita
Ajira Manisa
Chhuritie Loda
Kshanika Satya
Mahadipa
Muktagadara Kshudha
Amara Chita
Luhara Manisa