Triumph of virtue

The novel Madidunno Maharaya talks about corruption and ill-treatment of women, and discusses learning and education

Madiddunno Maharaya opens with the astrologer Kitta jois reciting the ‘panchaanga’ (traditional almanac/calendar) for the day, which reveals that the incidents in the novel took place in ‘pramadinaama samvatsara’, that is, around the mid-19th century. M. S. Puttanna’s novel Madiddunno Maharaya (the title is a Kannada proverb, similar in meaning to “as you sow so shall you reap”), was published in 1915. Though the novel does not directly associate itself with any of the concerns of the reform movements, it does talk about corruption and ill-treatment of women, and discusses learning and education. Puttanna was a great admirer of the late ruler of Mysore, Krishnaraja Wodeyar III, and his novels are set in the times of the reign of this king, where the king usually puts in an appearance as the dispenser and upholder of justice.

Chastity and the final triumph of the Hindu view of moral and righteous behaviour are the main themes of this novel. It portrays the trials and tribulations of a Brahmin couple in a distant village in the Mysore Kingdom. In a long manifesto-like English preface to the novel, Puttanna outlines the ‘rules of grammar’ for writing novels and lists various events that take place in the novel. He says that daily-life characters in a novel should in their nature and deeds approach the ideal Rama and Seetha and Yudishtira and Draupadi. “If on the other hand human beings are invested with a character which approaches the heroes and heroines of the great epics, the effect is very great and the nearer such approach, the greater will be our admiration. The deified heroes should be our rules of Grammar and ordinary human beings with an elevated conduct should be the examples. In this view I tried my best to conceive certain persons who lived at a time much nearer to us.” With the specific mention of the period and the sacred-canonical basis for his characters, Puttanna sets the tone for his novel at the outset.

Sadashiva Dikshit, a widower, marries Thimmavva, and with Mahadeva, his son from his first marriage, and old mother, leaves Mysore and settles in Sanjewadi. Mahadeva later marries Seethavva. Mahadeva’s step-mother, Thimmavva, who has a daughter of her own, starts harassing Seethavva. Seethavva bears this harassment uncomplainingly. Sanjewadi is shown as a village full of gullible citizens exploited by a group of unscrupulous people, whose leader is an untouchable priest named Sidda, officiating in a Maari temple on the outskirts of Sanjewadi. Sidda’s ‘rags-to-riches-respectability-and-power’ story is narrated in a full chapter. Sidda’s lecherous eyes fall on Seethavva who used to go to Arundamma’s house, not far from the Maari temple, to worship the sacred Tulsi plant there. Sidda’s lust is encouraged by Narappayya.

Narappayya is the discredited and once viciously violent teacher of the village school, whose students had turned against him and had punished him brutally. Though Sadashiva Dikshit nurses him back to health despite the violence faced by his son Mahadeva in the school, Narappayya turns against him. When Sidda realizes that none of his enticements is going to lure Seethavva, he tries to molest her when she was alone. She escapes and unable to bear this trauma, falls severely ill and her family, thinking that she had died of the illness, makes preparations for her cremation. The wood used for her cremation was not dry enough and her body does not get completely burnt. Moreover, she was very much alive. Anandbhatji, a holy-man and tantrik, who was passing by the cremation-ground realizes that she is still alive and revives her. Seethavva rejoins her husband, and Sidda is punished by Anandbhatji. Amase, a thief, reveals the misdeeds of the gang of thieves and they too are arrested. Sanjewadi is in ruins by the end of the novel. While the others are being taken to prison, Amase who was released because he had turned informer, looks at them and shouts, ‘madidda unno maharaya, madidda unno maharaya.’

One cannot dispute Puttanna’s astuteness in incorporating the ‘cremation-ground’ incident. It conforms to the ‘rules of grammar’ that he proposes in the preface. The female protagonist in Madiddunno Maharaya, Seethavva, is supposed to be a prototype of the ideal Seetha of Ramayana and her essential goodness and virtue are to be upheld at any cost. A parallel is drawn between Seethavva and Seetha of Ramayana who had emerged unscathed from the agniparikshe, the fire-test of virtue forced on her by her husband Rama. What more is needed to proclaim that even death bows down before one who leads a virtuous life. This secures Puttanna’s world within its moral laws and he gives it to us as the message of the story.

Commenting on the novel, M. G. Krishnamurthy had observed that Puttanna strongly felt that there should be a close relationship between the language of the novel and day-to-day speech and that the novelist should choose the subjects/topics for his novel from the world around him. This indicates Puttanna’s belief that the writer’s powers of imagination should be related to the specific culture in which he lives. Krishnamurthy says that the ‘denseness’ of ‘specific descriptions’ in this novel prevents it from becoming a manual of morals and “even though at some points the novel is a document of social issues, at some places an exciting story, and at some places a low farce, since this novelist is completely and unconsciously committed to the accepted values of the society all these diverse features come together.”

G. S. Amur considers this novel as serving advance notice on the future growth of the novel in Kannada. Amur goes on to comment: “Madiddunno Maharaya’s sharp realism comes from its stark portrayal of human corruption and the consequent break up of society.” Puttanna’s novel shows that societal ills like corruption, which the reform-novels expressed disgust at, was a feature of society even in the past. One of the main reasons why this novel has got its share of credit is that it never claimed to set right the ills of the society or offered solutions to contemporary problems. Madiddunno Maharaya is a much-discussed early novel because of its unapologetic tone and the writer’s belief in what he was writing.

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S. Jayasrinivasa Rao is a literary historian and translator living in Hyderabad. He is a teacher at Aurora’s Technological & Research Institute, Hyderabad. [email protected]

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