Author

SATURDAY PAGE INDIAN EXPRESS NOV 26 1977On October 1977

Writers of repute 32

On October 7, 1977, Hema Devi wrote a letter to me that called into question one of the blind practices of Hindu culture, namely, to deprive young widows of flowers, bangles, and the vermilion and to compel them for an ugly hair dressing. She declares: “My novels decry all social fads”

I met her last September at Hyderabad in the artistically decorated chambers of her beautiful mansion. Her husband, Sri B.N. Gowd, is an Engineer in the State Services. Her father, Sri Rama Gowd, was a feudal lord and a mill-owner who believed that the place of woman was next only to man. HemaDevi mentally rebelled against feudalism and exploitation and avowed that she should defend the silently suffering Telugu women in her writings.

Hema Devi was born on September 14, 1931, at Nizamabad. She migrated to Hyderabad when she was hardly out of her teens, and she has been staying in the metropolis since then. She saw the dying days of the dictatorial Nizam. She participated in the jubilant celebrations held on the formation of Andhra Pradesh. But her mind was never in politics. She knew that ‘more than her person, her writings were to interest her readers’

Bomma Hema Devi is her pen name. She was affectionately called Yamunavva by her mother and Rukmini by her father

Before she became Hema Devi she wrote many novels under another pen name ‘Devi Rama’

She knows little English and less Sanskrit. Her passion for writing soon saw her as a writer. Her rustic simplicity flows out in an elegant style, to sparkle with the brilliance of rebellious thought

HemaDevi does not delight by prodigality of invention or by the creation of a large gallery of characters. She has no alteration of contrasted scenes. But she draws our attention to the formal quality of composition, to design, to the subordination of the parts to the whole and the whole being the exploration of relations between her characters or their relations to a central situation or theme. Therefore, her criticism of life is an aspect of her design. As she has no knowledge of the theories of fiction, she does not regard herself as an artist.

‘Mahananda’ exhorts that we do away with the decadent customs, traditions, and uneasy habits under whose dead weight the hapless woman helplessly groans. ‘Pogamanchu’ criticises the taboos in the man-woman relationships. ‘Manaswini’ questions the restrictions imposed upon the grown-up brothers and sisters in their mutual relations and justifies their longing for identification in outlook and unification of sentiment. ‘Deepa’ propagates that woman should invariably have economic freedom and freedom of thought. It is a powerful criticism of dowry system. ‘Samsara Bandham’ eulogises the breakup of the joint family set up in our society

In her first novels ‘Navodayam’,’Navarasaalu’ ‘Pancharangulu’ and ‘Samsaram’ the source of her writing is the confusion in an immature mind between literature and life. But they are dazzling examples of her economy of writing and her power of making her characters expose themselves in their own words, so that we know them through and through and can imagine them in situations she has never described.

Writing about her books she says, “Except two, rest of my writings have already been published. But those very two unpublished novels are my best” The first of her not yet printed novels is a lovely story ‘Mahodayam.’ Her second unpublished novel is a social novel, dealing with the problem of unwed mothers. Indira, her heroine, braves the rigours of life and being fully conscious of her situation, she is apologetic but not yielding. The novel holds the mirror to the rustic beauties, urban luxuries, and the ever-increasing problem of unemployment.

‘Kumkuma Poolu’ which won first prize in Stories for Movies competition held by Andhra Bhoomi Publishers, deals with the widow’s plight. ‘Bangaaru goodu’ deals with the practice of wedlock. Hema Devi protests that woman is not a gift to be given away like a doll.

‘Navodayam’ was dedicated to the famous character artiste Sri Gummadi Venkateshwar Rao. It was based on a real-life incident. In the crossroads of MozamJahi market, a lady was publicly assaulted. Veena, NandaRani and Rakesh catch hold of the culprits and punish them. ‘Pancha Rangulu’ asserts that woman should not be slavish. ‘Samsaram’ heckles the middle-aged husbands who feel jealous of their wives.

S. R. M Kondamudi