KOCHI: Around 30 years ago, V Madhavan Nair, popularly known as ‘Mali’, would go to Chinmaya Mission School at Tripunithura every Sunday to narrate stories to children.
The children would walk all the way to the school from Tripunithura and Punithura discussing stories they had heard the previous session and excitedly awaiting the new ones they would hear the next session.
Mali would narrate stories from his ‘Mali Ramayanam’, ‘Mali Bhagavatham’ and ‘Mali Bharatham’. While narrating them, he would become one of them. He even brought poets to the school for he wanted the children to listen to poetry. Mali, literally, lived for the children and no one can dispute his contributions.
But, did he ever get his due? The answer would be an emphatic ‘no’. His 99th birth anniversary that fell on December 6 too passed without acknowledging his contributions to the field of children’s literature.
Children’s writer P I Sankara Narayanan says he never got his due. “There might be exceptions like Kunjunni Mashu or Sumangala. But, Mali never got what he truly deserved. He died on July 2, 1994, and great writer Vaikkom Mohammed Basheer passed away July 5, 1994. Just a matter of three days. But, did we ever witness any observance to acknowledge Mali’s works?,” he asks.
“There is no dispute over the fact that Basheer was a great writer. But, that does not mean ‘Mali’ lacked any of that caliber,” he adds.
Mali’s debut children’s novel ‘Circus’ , published during the 1950’s, was a trendsetter. He wrote shortened versions of epics - ‘ Mali Ramayanam’, Mali Bhagavatham’ and ‘Mali Bharatham’ - which established him as a household name.
He wrote 53 books, including 40, for children. Out of it, seven were in English. To top it all, he wrote ‘Karnasaptham’, a script purely in Malayalam for Kathakali.
It was performed at around 10,000 stages. “It was an instant hit with the people as simple Malayalam words were used in the lyrics. Hence, it could strike a chord with the laity. Besides, it talks about the first tryst of Kunthi and her son Karna,” Sankaranarayanan remembers. It was first sung on stage by Vaikom Thankappan Pillai. His most famous works includes ‘ Circus’, ‘Porattam’, ‘Janthusthan’, ‘Kishkintha’, ‘Sarvajithinte Samudra Sanjaram’ and ‘Sarvajith Himalayathil’.
Another writer Ashtamoorthi feels that the state is yet to give due recognition to children’s writers. “Do you think it is an easy task to write for children? It is the most strenuous task. Unfortunately, there is a tendency to underrate their work. Perhaps, that might be the reason why the contributions in this field are less. This often scares away many talented people from working on children’s literature. But, the scenario is absolutely different in other countries. Mali too had to face such a fate,” he says.
Hema Vaidyanandan, an ardent admirer of Mali and one among hundreds of children who could listen to his narrations, says: “It was a huge loss for hundreds of children when he wound up his story sessions after shifting to Ernakulam from Punithura. We used to look forward to that Sunday. He was a simple man and became one among us while narrating stories. His death left a big vacuum in the field of Children’s literature,” says Hema Vaidyanandan.
V Madhavan Nair was born at Thiruvanathapuram in 1915 as the son of Sadasya Thilakan T K Vellupillai, who authored ‘Travancore Manual’ and the first elected Deputy Speaker. Mali had served as station director of All-India Radio and editor of National Book Trust among many other responsibilities.