A TRIBUTE TO
P. RAJA RAMACHANDRA RAO
Buddiga Subbarayan
P. R. Ramachandra Rao, as
he is popularly known, passed away on 2nd March, 2007 after a brief illness. He
was 95 years. By profession he was a much sought after Advocate. He was legal
advisor to many a PSUs and many leading companies in Andhra Pradesh. He became
Senior Advocate of the Supreme Court of India in 1943. He was also legal
Advisor to German Embassy in India. As a son of the soil and scion of the
spirit he deserved to be remembered forever for his worthy contributions to the
world of culture.
Kavipanchakam was
Rao’s last contribution (2007) to the field of Telugu literature. It was a
literary criticism on the five great men of Telugu literature – Tikkana (mahabharatam),
Potana (mahabhagavatam), Vemana (sataka poems), Srinatha (prabhandakavya),
Gurajada (kanyasulkam - a modem play), Introduction to this Rao’s
latest literary work, Sudhama (AIR) (published in Jagati, March, 2007) eulogized his approach as
meticulous, full of intellectual integrity. His recent work on art ‘The Splendor
of Andhra Art’ too has these qualities.
I came into contact with
Rao during his last ten years of his life. He used to come to me for advice on
book printing, publication ‘The Splendor of Andhra 2005’. He was a student
of Presidency College, Madras and stayed in Victoria Hostel during mid 1930s, I
was also a student of that college and hostel later in 1945. My philosophy of life
– Marcus Aurelius’s ‘Execute every act of your life as if it is your last -
attracted Mr. Rao towards me and we were more closer than ever.
Rao’s erudite lecture on ‘Modern
Indian Painting’ delivered at Oxford University (1949) was a masterpiece.
His ‘Art of N agarjunakonda’ won President’s Award (1956) for its excellence
on art history and critical evaluation. His other works of art ‘Alampur’ ,
‘Bhuvaneswara’, ‘Contemporary Indian Art’, ‘Amaravati and Andhra
Sculpture’ are some rare contributions to the world of art history on
Andhra art, painting and sculpture.
Apart from these print
media outstanding contributions, he moved onto electronic media by producing
outstanding documentaries telecast over Doordarshan on the subjects – ‘The
Heritage of the Empire of Vijayanagara’, ‘The Splendor of Andhra Art’, ‘Andhra
Vaibhavam’, ‘The River Krishna’. Other outstanding visual works monuments
of the Telugu country in this series are Nagarjunakonda, Amaravati and
the temples of Srisailam, Srikalahasti, Bhadrachalam, Simhachalam and Alampur
await telecast. He was assigned a documentary on ‘The River Godavari’ which
could not see the light of the day during his lifetime.
Ramachandra Rao undertook
a lecture tour around the world between 1964 and 1972 to address at as many as
87 higher centers of learning like universities where he spoke on ‘Indian
Art’ , ‘Constitution Law’, ‘Political Science’, and Government. In
the process, he had encountered with eminent people - de Valera, G.D.H. Cole,
Justice Reginald Clark, D. Sena Nayake from different countries. Other luminaries
from India - Gandhi, Nehru, Jiddu Krishnamurti, Ramana Maharshi, Tagore,
Netaji, Sarojini Naidu and so on - at the centers of learning he visited
Australia, Denmark, Canada, England, France, Germany, Japan, Russia, Singapore,
Sri Lanka, Switzerland, The Netherlands, U.S.A. etc.
Mr. Rao penned First
Person Singular in 1989; though he said it was not his autobiography, it is
full of personal dialogues with eminent luminaries world over including India
*
A review article on First
Person Singular by the Editor appeared in Triveni long ago.