Buddhism had impact on Telugu writers

GUNTUR: The deputy speaker of AP Legislative Assembly Mandali Buddha Prasad asserted on the need to promote common people’s language in literature against scholastic language and praised that Buddhism promoted common people's language during a seminar at Guntur on Wednesday. The Sahitya Akademy and JKC College together held a two-day seminar on “Gauthama Buddha-refle-ction in Telugu literature and culture” wherein Mr Buddha Prasad and others addressed the gatherings.

Mr Prasad said that Bu-ddhism had a big impact on Telugu literature and in promoting common people’s language for centuries. He said that generally holy scriptures would be in scholastic language but Buddhist monks prea-ched Buddhism in local languages. Buddhism has been adopted by Telugu people for centuries.

He said that Buddhism preaches humanity, equality and peace in society. He pointed out that a majority of Telugu authors have written with influence of Buddhism and humanism. He asserted on the need to research on the Telugu language of Buddhist era and hoped that Buddhism would be rejuvenated in the new capital Amaravati as the name was taken from ancient capital.

Telugu Sahitya Academy awardee and poet Papineni Sivasankar said that Buddha was the first historical person of India who first preached casteless society for equality. The poet explained the impact of Buddhism on Telugu literature in detail. Sahitya Akademi Telugu director and poet Dr N. Gopi said that Buddhist sculptures and artefacts have been developed worl-dwide but the Buddhist literature has not grown acc-ordingly during Buddhist era.

He said the Buddhist literature reached public after Buddha period. It attracted Telugu people. JKC College correspondent and secretary J. Muralimohan, principal Prof. Nageswara Rao, PG courses director S.R.K. Pr-asad, poet Penugonda Lakshminarayana, poet Kurra Jitendrababu and others addressed the meeting.