Babukodi Venkataramana Karanth (

Kannada Kannada (; ಕನ್ನಡ, ), originally romanised Canarese, is a Dravidian language spoken predominantly by the people of Karnataka in southwestern India, with minorities in all neighbouring states. It has around 47 million native s ...

: ಬಾಬುಕೋಡಿ ವೆಂಕಟರಮಣ ಕಾರಂತ) (19 September 1929 – 1 September 2002) widely known as B. V. Karanth was an Indian film director, playwright, actor, screenwriter, composer, and dramatist known for his works in the Kannada theatre,

Kannada cinema Kannada cinema, also known as Sandalwood, or Chandanavana, is the segment of Indian cinema dedicated to the production of motion pictures in the Kannada language widely spoken in the state of Karnataka. The 1934 film ''Sati Sulochana'' directed ...

, and

Hindi cinema Hindi cinema, popularly known as Bollywood and formerly as Bombay cinema, refers to the film industry based in Mumbai, engaged in production of motion pictures in Hindi language. The popular term Bollywood, is a portmanteau of "Bombay" (fo ...

. One of the pioneers of the

Parallel Cinema Parallel cinema, or New Indian Cinema, is a film movement in Indian cinema that originated in the state of West Bengal in the 1950s as an alternative to the mainstream commercial Indian cinema. Inspired by Italian Neorealism, Parallel Cinema ...

, Karanth was an alumnus of the

National School of Drama National School of Drama (NSD) is a theatre training institute situated at New Delhi, India. It is an autonomous organization under Ministry of Culture, Government of India. It was set up in 1959 by the Sangeet Natak Akademi and became an indepe ...

(1962) and later, its Director.http://nsd.gov.in/nsd_schoolfelicit.htm He received the

Sangeet Natak Akademi Award Sangeet Natak Akademi Award (IPA: Saṅgīta Nāṭaka Akādamī Puraskāra), also known as the Akademi Puraskar, is an award given by the Sangeet Natak Akademi Sangeet Natak Akademi (The National Academy of Music, Dance and Drama in Englis ...

(1976), six

National Film Awards The National Film Awards is the most prominent film award ceremony in India. Established in 1954, it has been administered, along with the International Film Festival of India and the Indian Panorama, by the Indian government's Directorat ...

, and the civilian honor

Padma Shri Padma Shri (IAST: ''padma śrī''), also spelled Padma Shree, is the fourth-highest Indian honours system, civilian award of the Republic of India, after the Bharat Ratna, the Padma Vibhushan and the Padma Bhushan. Instituted on 2 January 1954, ...

for his contributions towards the field of art.http://www.themusicmagazine.com/spandana25.htmlhttp://www.udupipages.com/home/prasanga/rrc6.html

Biography

Born into a Kananda speaking family of Manchi, a village near Babukodi in

Bantwal taluk Bantwal taluk is a taluk of Dakshina Kannada district. The headquarters is the town of Bantwal Bantwal () is a taluk in Dakshina Kannada district, Karnataka, India. It is located East of Mangalore city center. BC Road-Kaikamba of Bantwal ...

of Dakshina Kannada district in 1929, Karanth's passion for theatre started at an early age. His first tryst with theatre was when he was in standard III – he acted in ''Nanna Gopala'', a play directed by P.K. Narayana. He then ran away from home and joined the legendary Gubbi Veeranna drama company where he worked alongside Rajkumar who also was starting out then as a novice.

Gubbi Veeranna Gubbi Hampanna Veeranna (1891 – 1972) was an Indian theatre director. He was one of the pioneers and most prolific contributors to Kannada theatre. He established the drama company, ''Gubbi Sree Channabasaveshwara Nataka Company'', which play ...

sent Karanth to

Banaras Varanasi (; ; also Banaras or Benares (; ), and Kashi.) is a city on the Ganges river in northern India that has a central place in the traditions of pilgrimage, death, and mourning in the Hindu world. * * * * The city has a syncretic tra ...

to gain a Master of Arts degree, where he also underwent training in

Hindustani music Hindustani classical music is the classical music of northern regions of the Indian subcontinent. It may also be called North Indian classical music or, in Hindustani, ''shastriya sangeet'' (). It is played in instruments like the violin, sit ...

under Guru Omkarnath Thakur. Thereafter, along with his wife,

Prema Karanth Prema Karanth (15 August 1936 – 29 October 2007) was an Indian theatre personality and the first-ever woman film-maker of Kannada cinema. She was the wife of B. V. Karanth and was known for the children's plays that she staged. She became the ...

, Karanth set up "Benaka", one of Bangalore's oldest theatre groups. It is an acronym for Bengalooru Nagara Kalavidaru. Then, Prema took up a teaching job in Delhi and supported Karanth through the

. He was to return the compliment after he graduated from the

NSD In Internet computing, NSD (for "name server daemon") is an open-source Domain Name System (DNS) server. It was developed by NLnet Labs of Amsterdam in cooperation with the RIPE NCC, from scratch as an authoritative name server (i.e., not imple ...

, and eventually became its director. He later graduated from the

(NSD), New Delhi, in 1962, then headed by

Ebrahim Alkazi Ebrahim Alkazi (18 October 1925 – 4 August 2020) was an Indian theatre director and drama teacher. A rigid disciplinarian, he instilled in his acting students an awe and reverence that they still carry with them, with several of them havin ...

. Between 1969 and 1972, he worked as a drama instructor at the

Sardar Patel Vidyalaya Sardar Patel Vidyalaya (SPV) is an education school located in Lodhi Estate, New Delhi, India. The school is named after a leader of the Indian independence movement, and independent India's first Home Minister and Deputy Prime Minister, Sarda ...

, New Delhi after which the couple returned to Bangalore. Here Karanth dabbled in some cinema as well as music and was involved with the likes of

Girish Karnad Girish Karnad (19 May 1938 – 10 June 2019) was an Indian actor, film director, Kannada writer, playwright and a Jnanpith awardee, who predominantly worked in South Indian cinema and Bollywood. His rise as a playwright in the 1960s marked the ...

and

U.R. Ananthamurthy Udupi Rajagopalacharya Ananthamurthy (21 December 1932 – 22 August 2014) was an Indian contemporary writer and critic in the Kannada language. He was born in Thirtahalli Taluk and is considered one of the pioneers of the Navya movement. In 199 ...

in these ventures. He then returned to the NSD, this time as its Director in 1977. As the director of NSD, Karanth took theatre to far-flung corners of India. He conducted several workshops in places far away as

Madurai Madurai ( , also , ) is a major city in the Indian state of Tamil Nadu. It is the cultural capital of Tamil Nadu and the administrative headquarters of Madurai District. As of the 2011 census, it was the third largest Urban agglomeration in ...

in Tamil Nadu. After his stint as the director of NSD, the Madhya Pradesh government invited him to head the Rangamandal repertory under the aegis of the Bharat Bhavan. After rendering yeoman service to the theatre scene in

Madhya Pradesh Madhya Pradesh (, ; meaning 'central province') is a state in central India. Its capital is Bhopal, and the largest city is Indore, with Jabalpur, Ujjain, Gwalior, Sagar, and Rewa being the other major cities. Madhya Pradesh is the seco ...

between 1981 and '86, Karanth returned to Karnataka. In 1989, the Karnataka government invited him to set up a repertory in Mysore, which he named

Rangayana Rangayana ( kn, ರಂಗಾಯಣ) is a theatre institute which operates from Mysore, Karnataka, India. It works as an autonomous cultural institute. The organization consists of a professional repertory company, a theatre-training institute ...

and headed until 1995. He was diagnosed with

prostate cancer Prostate cancer is cancer of the prostate. Prostate cancer is the second most common cancerous tumor worldwide and is the fifth leading cause of cancer-related mortality among men. The prostate is a gland in the male reproductive system that sur ...

in the late 1990s and died at 8 p.m. (

IST Ist or IST may refer to: Information Science and Technology * Bachelor's or Master's degree in Information Science and Technology * Graduate School / Faculty of Information Science and Technology, Hokkaido University, Japan * Graduate School ...

) on 1 September 2002 in a private hospital in Bangalore.

Translator

His translations from Sanskrit into Hindi include Swapna Vasavadatta, Uttararama Charita and Mrichchakatika . He has also translated a large number of plays from Kannada to Hindi and vice versa. His translation of Girish Karnad's play Tughlaq into Hindi/Urdu has attained cult status.

Institutions

* 1962: graduated from NSD, winning an award as the best all - round student * 1977 - 1981: Director of NSD * 1981 - 1988: Founding director of Rangamandal at Bharat Bhavan, Bhopal * 1989 - 1995: Founding director of Rangayana, Mysore

Legacy

Karanth entered the Kannada theatre scene in the late 1960s and early '70s. His entry brought about a sea change in Kannada theatre which then was steeped in the old, formal proscenium style. His plays like Jokumara Swamy, Sankranti, Huchu Kudure and Oedipus to name a few, which were directed in the early 1970s, were hailed as trendsetters. These plays touched upon all aspects of theatre like language, music, song, stylisation The innovative use of music was one Karanth's biggest contributions to theatre. One of Karanth's strengths was his ability to draw on classical, traditional and folk forms and fuse them in his compositions. His plays were less famous for design as for their musical content, which became part of the prose of theatre." In 2010, at the 12th

Bharat Rang Mahotsav Bharat Rang Mahotsav (BRM) (भारत रंग महोत्सव) or the National Theatre Festival, started in 1999, is the annual theatre festival organised by National School of Drama (NSD), New Delhi. The festival was started to showcas ...

, the annual theatre festival of

, Delhi, a tribute exhibition dedicated to life, works and theatre of B.V. Karanth and

Habib Tanvir Habib Tanvir (1 September 1923 – 8 June 2009) was one of the most popular Indian Urdu, Hindi playwrights, a theatre director, poet and actor. He was the writer of plays such as, ''Agra Bazar'' (1954) and ''Charandas Chor'' (1975). A pio ...

was displayed. Jnanpith awardee

Nirmal Verma Nirmal Verma (3 April 192925 October 2005) was a Hindi writer, novelist, activist and translator. He is credited as being one of the pioneers of the ''Nai Kahani'' (New Story) literary movement of Hindi literature, wherein his first collection ...

had once described Karanth as “the authentic desi genius of Indian theatre”.

Plays of B. V. Karanth

Karanth directed over a hundred plays, more than half of which were in Kannada with Hindi close behind. He also directed plays in English,

Telugu Telugu may refer to: * Telugu language, a major Dravidian language of India *Telugu people, an ethno-linguistic group of India * Telugu script, used to write the Telugu language ** Telugu (Unicode block), a block of Telugu characters in Unicode S ...

Malayalam Malayalam (; , ) is a Dravidian language spoken in the Indian state of Kerala and the union territories of Lakshadweep and Puducherry (Mahé district) by the Malayali people. It is one of 22 scheduled languages of India. Malayalam was des ...

Tamil Tamil may refer to: * Tamils, an ethnic group native to India and some other parts of Asia **Sri Lankan Tamils, Tamil people native to Sri Lanka also called ilankai tamils **Tamil Malaysians, Tamil people native to Malaysia * Tamil language, nativ ...

, Punjabi,

Urdu Urdu (;"Urdu"
''

Sanskrit Sanskrit (; attributively , ; nominally , , ) is a classical language belonging to the Indo-Aryan branch of the Indo-European languages. It arose in South Asia after its predecessor languages had diffused there from the northwest in the late ...

and

Gujarati Gujarati may refer to: * something of, from, or related to Gujarat, a state of India * Gujarati people, the major ethnic group of Gujarat * Gujarati language, the Indo-Aryan language spoken by them * Gujarati languages, the Western Indo-Aryan sub- ...

. ''Hayavadana'' (by Girish Karnad), ''Kattale Belaku'', ''Huchu Kudure'', ''Evam Indrajit'', ''Oedipus'', ''Sankranti'', ''Jokumara Swami'', ''Sattavara Neralu'', ''Huttava Badidare'' and ''Gokula Nirgamana'' are some of his most popular plays in Kannada. Of the forty or so plays he directed in Hindi,

Macbeth ''Macbeth'' (, full title ''The Tragedie of Macbeth'') is a tragedy by William Shakespeare. It is thought to have been first performed in 1606. It dramatises the damaging physical and psychological effects of political ambition on those w ...

(using the traditional

Yakshagana Yakshagaana is a traditional theatre, developed in Dakshina Kannada, Udupi, Uttara Kannada, Shimoga and western parts of Chikmagalur districts, in the state of Karnataka and in Kasaragod district in Kerala that combines dance, music, dialogue, ...

dance drama form), King Lear, Chandrahasa, Hayavadana, Ghasiram Kotwal, Mrichha Katika, Mudra Rakshasa, and Malavikagni Mitra are some of the more popular ones. Karanth also revelled in directing children and directed several children plays like ''Panjara Shale'', ''Neeli Kudure'', ''Heddayana'', ''Alilu Ramayana'' and ''The Grateful Man''.

Benaka

In 1974, Karanth started ''BeNaKa'' a repertory in Bangalore. Benaka was an acronym for ''Bengalooru Nagara Kalavidaru''. Benaka stages several hugely popular plays like ''Hayavadana'' all across Karnataka and even overseas. At Benaka, Karanth also took a special interest in children's theatre and directed several plays with children. This group has been taken care of by Prema Karanth, Karanth's late wife and a noted theatre personality in her own right. She died on 29-10-07.

Contribution to Madhya Pradesh theatre

Karanth was largely responsible for starting the new theatre movement in

. As director of the NSD, at the invitation of the Bharat Bhavan in Bhopal, he organized a training-cum-production camp in 1973. In the 1980s, he returned to set up the Rangmandal repertory in Bharat Bhavan. This was to be the first-ever repertory in the state and he became the main creative spirit behind the now-legendary Bharat Bhavan. Rangmandal, for the first time, folk professionals were used for training contemporary actors, and the repertory also included folk performers among its members. Apart from Hindi, plays were also produced in dialects such as Bundelkhandi, Malavi and Chhattisgarhi which created huge ticket-buying audiences for the Rangmandira.

Contribution to Andhra Pradesh theatre

With the integration of Alarippu and National school of Drama-New Delhi, Karanth had contributed three great plays in Telugu. Collaborated with Surabhi theatre of Andhra Pradesh, Karanth conducted three workshops respectively 'Bhishma' in 1996, 'Chandipriya' in 1997 and 'Basthidevatha yadamma'. It is his dedication that Karanth spent his time during the workshops in corner villages of Andhra Pradesh to brought up the dramas.

Filmmaking

Karanth directed four feature films and four documentaries, apart from scoring the music for 26 films. He co-directed films like

Vamsha Vriksha Vamsha Vriksha (The genealogy tree), is a 1971 Indian Kannada-language film directed by B. V. Karanth and Girish Karnad, based on S. L. Bhyrappa's novel of the same name. The film won the National Film Award for Best Direction.Shampa Banerjee, ...

and Tabbaliyu Neenade Magane with

Awards and honors

;Civilian honors *

Padmashri Padma Shri (IAST: ''padma śrī''), also spelled Padma Shree, is the fourth-highest civilian award of the Republic of India, after the Bharat Ratna, the Padma Vibhushan and the Padma Bhushan. Instituted on 2 January 1954, the award is conferred ...

- Government of India, (1981) *

Kalidas Samman The Kalidas Samman ( hi, कालिदास सम्मान) is an arts award presented annually by the Government of Madhya Pradesh in India. The award is named after Kālidāsa, a renowned Classical Sanskrit writer of ancient India. The ...

- Government of

, (1976) * Gubbi Veeranna Award - Government of

Karnataka Karnataka (; ISO: , , also known as Karunāḍu) is a state in the southwestern region of India. It was formed on 1 November 1956, with the passage of the States Reorganisation Act. Originally known as Mysore State , it was renamed ''Karnat ...

, (1976) ;National Honors *

(1976) ;

* 1971 –

National Film Award for Best Direction The National Film Award for Best Direction is an honour presented annually at India's National Film Awards ceremony by the Directorate of Film Festivals (DFF), an organisation set up by the Indian Ministry of Information and Broadcasting. Since ...

–

* 1971 –

National Film Award for Best Feature Film in Kannada The National Film Award for Best Feature Film in Kannada is one of the National Film Awards presented annually by the Directorate of Film Festivals, the organization set up by Ministry of Information and Broadcasting, India. It is one of several ...

–

* 1975 –

National Film Award for Best Feature Film The National Award for Best Feature Film is one of the categories in the National Film Awards presented annually by the Directorate of Film Festivals, the organisation set up by Ministry of Information and Broadcasting in India. It is one of sev ...

–

Chomana Dudi Chomana Dudi ( kn, ಚೋಮನ ದುಡಿ, ''Choma's Drum'') is a feature film in the Kannada language. It is based on a novel of the same name, written by Shivaram Karanth. The film was released in the year 1975 and won the ''Swarna Kamal' ...

* 1976 –

National Film Award for Best Music Direction The National Film Award for Best Music Direction (the Silver Lotus Award) is an honour presented annually at the National Film Awards by the Directorate of Film Festivals to a musician who has composed the best score for films produced within t ...

: Rishya Shrunga * 1977 – National Film Award for Best Music Direction:

Ghatashraddha ''Ghatashraaddha'' () is a 1977 Indian Kannada language film directed by Girish Kasaravalli starring Meena Kuttappa, Narayana Bhat and Ajith Kumar in lead roles. It is based on a novella by eminent Kannada writer U. R. Ananthamurthy. The film wa ...

* 1977 – National Film Award for Best Feature Film in Kannada– Tabbaliyu Neenade Magane ;

Karnataka State Film Awards Karnataka State Film Awards are the most notable and prestigious film awards given for Kannada film industry in Karnataka, India. These are considered the highest awards for Kannada language films. They are given annually by the Government ...

* 1971-72 - First Best Film – Vamsha Vruksha * 1971-72 - Best Dialogue Writer – Vamsha Vruksha * 1975-76 - First Best Film – Chomana Dudi * 1975-76 - Best Music Director – Hamsageethe ;

Filmfare Awards South Filmfare Awards South is the South Indian segment of the annual Filmfare Awards, presented by the Filmfare magazine of The Times Group to honour both artistic and technical excellence of professionals in the Indian film industry encompassing ...

* 1972 - Best Director Kannada –

* 1975 - Best Director Kannada –

Documentary film on B. V. Karanth

In 2012,

Films Division The Films Division of India (FDI), commonly referred as Films Division, was established in 1948 following the independence of India. It was the first state film production and distribution unit, under the Ministry of Information and Broadcastin ...

produced a 93-minute film on BV Karanth called BV Karanth:Baba. The film bases itself on BV Karanth's autobiography in Kannada called ''Illiralaare, Allige Hogalaare'' (I can't stay here, I won't go there) compiled by well known

writer Vaidehi.

Works

*
Tughlaq (Hindi)
by Girish Karnad. Tr. by B. V. Karanth. Rajkamal Prakashan Pvt Ltd, 2005. .

References

External links

*
Natarang Pratishthan: Archive and Resource Centre for Indian Theatre
{{DEFAULTSORT:Karanth, B. V. 20th-century Indian film directors Recipients of the Padma Shri in arts Recipients of the Sangeet Natak Akademi Award National School of Drama alumni National School of Drama faculty Kannada film score composers Kannada film directors Indian theatre directors Hindi theatre Indian male dramatists and playwrights 2002 deaths 1929 births People from Dakshina Kannada district Kannada dramatists and playwrights Filmfare Awards South winners Best Music Direction National Film Award winners Best Director National Film Award winners Indian arts administrators 20th-century Indian dramatists and playwrights 20th-century Indian composers Screenwriters from Karnataka Indian male stage actors Male actors in Kannada theatre 20th-century Indian male actors Kannada screenwriters Film directors from Karnataka Dramatists and playwrights from Karnataka 20th-century Indian male writers Directors who won the Best Feature Film National Film Award 20th-century Indian screenwriters Recipients of the Sangeet Natak Akademi Fellowship