Dinakara Desai

Dinakara Desai was a poet, writer, educationist and political and social activist. He is known as Chutuka Brahma for his famous poetry form called “Chutuka”. He has made major contributions towards the literary development of the Uttara Kannada district of Karnataka. . Dinakara Desai was born on 10-09-1909 in Antaravalli villege, Uttara Kannada District. Dattatreya and Ambika were his parents, belongs to Handadokkalu desai family. He persued his B.A. degree in Mysore, M.A. and L.LB. from Bombay University.
Career
Dinakara Desai started his legal practice at Belgaum. He was influenced by labour union activists M.N.Joshi and Thakkar Basha, who motivated him to the labour movement. He joined the ‘Servants of India Society’ which was an organisation that was founded by Gopalkrishna Gokhale. The membership to this organisation was very stringent and the members were admitted only on oath that they would serve the country without “expecting anything in return”. His initiation to social activism was when he had to fight for the rights of the dock workers in Mumbai who were Konkani people. Later he also went to the Bijapur and Dharwad to assist in providing relief when a severe drought had set into those regions. Later, Desai decided to focus on his native district of Uttara Kannada. He created Kanara Welfare Trust in 1953. Under this trust various schools and colleges were founded in this district. He also started a Kannada Weekly ‘Janasevak’ to create social and political awareness. He works for farmers also. Desai also had a career in politics and was once elected to the Parliament of India. Dinakar Desai was famous as a Poet. He also started writing poems in his mother tongue Konkani In 1930. It is learned that he commenced writing ‘Chutuka’ sometimes around the year 1955, and it became his signatur format. As a poet and writer he has written poems, dramas, novels etc. His famous books were “Makkala Padyagalu, Makkala Geetegalu, Hoo Gonchalu, Raitara Hadugalu, Dinakarana Chaupadi, Dinakarali Kavanaam (Konkani), Dasala, Na Kanda Paduvana (travel history), Prapanchada Kelasagara, Primary Education in India, Maritime Labour in India, The Mahamandaleshwaras under the Chalukyas of Kalyani etc.
Honours
Chutuka Brahma Dinakara Desai has bagged so many awards like -Bombay State Award in1956 for poetical works “Makkala Geeta”, Karnataka Sahitya Academi Award in 1972 in recognition of his contribution in literary field, “Varakavi” felicitation by Bombay Kannadigas (1973), Honorary Doctorate from Karnataka University, Dharwad (1975), Government of Karnataka awarded plaque with State map in recognition of service rendered in State Unification, B.N.Gupta Janmabhumi Award for Journalism (1976), Karnataka Sahitya Academi Award for “Dinakarana Choupadi” (1980). Dinakara desai toured Denmark to attend the convention of the International Lanour Organisation held at Copenhegan, Denmark (1945) and at Seattle, USA (1946). He also toured England in 1959 at the invitation of the British council.