Noted Tamil writer and Sahitya Akademi award winner, Joe D’ Cruz, on Friday charged that people have been “misguided for 60 years” about Sanskrit and had been kept away from learning it.
Speaking at the inauguration of the three-day ‘ Samskrit for Samanya’ , a conference at the Meenakshi College for Women here that seeks to take the language to the common people, Mr. D’Cruz asserted that Sanskrit was the window to India’s culture.
“Where is the great knowledge, culture of this country? We have been taken away from it,” he said.
The writer said there was a notion that Sanskrit was the preserve of the higher echelons of the society and it was the language of the Hindu texts. “But I must tell you it is great literature. You will find our heritage, culture through it,” Mr. D’Cruz pointed out.
It was not as though Sanskrit was being taken to a lower level to help the downtrodden access it. Rather, he said, it had always been a language of everyone and gave examples of Vyasa, Valmiki and Kalidasa and their great contribution to literature.
“Unless we know our history, how will we progress,” he asked.
Mr. D’Cruz had run into controversy last year due to his open support to Prime Minister Narendra Modi during the Lok Sabha elections. The writer is also the president of the Samskrita Bharati, Uttara Tamil Nadu.
Tamil writer says the language is window to India’s culture
