Belli Moda: How the upcoming Triveni museum in Mysuru will capture the psychological turmoil of women

Vietnamese Buddhist monk, poet and scholar Thich Nhat Hanh once famously remarked, “If you look deeply into the palm of your hand, you will see your parents and all generations of your ancestors. All of them are alive in this moment. Each is present in your body. You are a continuation of each of these people.”

Former aviation sector employee Meera Kumar is looking and intently reshaping House Number 1152 on Railway Station Road in Chamarajapuram area of Mysuru to not just see what her mother stood for but also show it to all those who are passionate about Kannada literature.

Come December and the property will throw open its doors to those looking for a sneak peek into the life and work of Triveni, one of the most prominent women Kannada writers. The 120-year-old house is being restored to stand as a symbol of expression of women's life and experiences in the 1940s to 1960s because it is the theme that Triveni captured in her writings.

Among the pantheon of gods in Karnataka, Triveni occupies a unique and significant position. It was her unique ability to capture the female experiences with all its psychological elements and moral dilemmas with a rare poignancy that set her apart.

Now, Meera Kumar, daughter of Anasuya Shankar, who took the pen name of Triveni, is dedicatedly restoring the heritage house and transforming it into a museum. The structure is aptly named after Triveni’s seventh novel Belli Moda (Silver Cloud). This novel was also adapted into a Kannada language film with the same title in 1967 by multilingual filmmaker Puttanna Kanagal. The film was remade in Malayalam as Swapnabhoomi (1967) and in Telugu as Palamansulu (1968).

It will be easy for a literary enthusiast to locate Belli Moda in Mysuru. He/she should hit Chamarajapuram Railway Station Road and ask someone for the legendary Kannada novelist Triveni’s house. They will point out the over-a-century-old house where Triveni lived and penned 21 novels and 41 short stories over a period of 12 years.

“I thought of redeveloping the house after visiting William Shakespeare’s heritage house in Stratford-Upon-Avon in the UK during my 2006 visit,” says Meera Kumar, founder chairperson of Triveni Shankar Sahitya Pratisthana (Triveni Shankar Literary Foundation).

Belli Moda will be the very first museum for a woman novelist in Karnataka and the third museum for women writers across India after the houses-turned-museums dedicated to Mahasweta Devi and Sarojini Naidu.

For Kannada literature connoisseurs, Triveni is a household name.

“Anasuya Shankar (1928-1963) is one of the best writers of the 1960s and she won phenomenal popularity because her works dealt with the sufferings and concerns of women in a men’s world. Her novels were a craze among not only women, but also men, from the 1940s and is still as popular even today,” says writer and translator Preethi Nagaraj.

Recognition far and wide

Supported by translations, Triveni’s works received recognition beyond Kannada writers.

Triveni’s writings got her recognition far and wide. For Avala Mane (Her Home), she received the Karnataka Sahitya Academy Award in 1960 and bagged the Devaraja Bahadur Award in 1962 for Samsyeya Magu (Problem Child). Posthumously, Triveni was awarded the Karnataka Motion Picture Award in 1974-75 for the Best Film Story for Kankana directed by MBS Prasad.

Interestingly, UR Ananthamurthy has written a script based on Triveni’s novel for the film. Her writings have been translated into many languages and have reached a far wider readership than otherwise possible. SM Ramaswamy translated Triveni’s novels Apasvara (Discordant Note), and Apajaya (Defeat) into Hindi. Her most important novel Sharapanjara (Cage of Arrows) was translated into English as The Mad Woman by Meera Narvekar.

Triveni’s husband SN Shankar has translated all of her novels into English and they are now getting ready to be published. He has also converted them into plays. Bekkina Kannu (Cat’s Eye) was translated into Telugu by Sharvani. Triveni’s Athithi Baralilla was published in an Urdu Newspaper in Pakistan. Several of her novels were adapted to the silver screen and won critical acclaim.

The one thing that clicked for readers of Triveni’s works is perhaps the relatability factor.

“Triveni remains immortal in the hearts and minds of her readers (and filmgoers), who cannot help but relate their own lives with those of her characters, who leap out of her pages with a sense of vividness and realism that only she could muster,” writer and scholar Dr Srikanta Shastry tells The Federal.

Triveni was known for the subjects she chose to write on, her writing style or narrative was easy to understand and made her popular among the masses. Her writings targeted complex psychological problems faced by ordinary people. She was an author of distinction and is loved and fondly read by people even six decades after her death. Though she wrote only for a short period of 12 years, her output during this time is prolific.

Anusuya Shankar chose the pen name ‘Triveni’ after Mahatma Gandhi’s ashes were immersed at ‘Triveni Sangam’, the confluence of rivers Ganga, Yamuna and Saraswathi.

Triveni wrote novels on the emotional repressions of middle-class women. This suppression becomes a necessity for the women to gain respectability in a middle-class family, but leads to various psychological problems. Through her works, Triveni suggests that no change in the condition of women is possible until men recognise the specificity of women’s psychology.

Highly contemporaneous

According to Srikanta Shastri, Triveni exhaustively explored the themes of sexual, financial and familial exploitation of women. These struck a chord with readers because they were highly contemporaneous.

Triveni accompanied, by her husband Shankar, used to visit Dr Srikanta Shastri’s house to discuss many of the doubts she had on historical matters for a few of her novels. Scholar and writer LS Sheshagiri Rao once said, “It was her early brush with psychology in college that enabled her to so beautifully capture the nuances of several otherwise troubling scenarios in so eminently readable a fashion.”

A family of litterateurs

Born on September 1, 1928, in a family of litterateurs, Triveni earned her Bachelor’s degree from Maharaja College, Mysuru in Psychology, Sociology and Political Science. She graduated in 1947 with a gold medal. Her father BM Krishnaswamy was the younger brother of doyen of Kannada literature BM Srikantaiah. Her younger sister Aryamba Pattabhi is also a famous Kannada writer. Triveni’s aunt Vani was another famous Kannada novelist. Though named Bhagirathi, Triveni was registered in the school records as ‘Anasuya’ and was fondly called as ‘Anchu’ at home. “Anasuya and SN Shankar, who was doing Honours in English Literature at Maharaja's College, shared many engaging discussions on their literary interests. In 1951, she married Shankar, who was teaching English at Sharada Vilas College,” recalled Meera Kumar.

Despite her accomplishments, Triveni suffered a void. Motherhood evaded her for a long time. Successive miscarriages after much-awaited pregnancies led to great despair. This eventually took a toll on her physical and emotional state. The prospect of waiting in dire anticipation, only to be left wanting at the end, proved mentally exhausting by the second time around. Expectedly, Triveni was able to successfully find a vent for these pent-up emotions through her pen. Her novel Atithi Baralilla (Guest Did Not Arrive) is the result of this experience and it iss to be one of her finest. Meera was born finally from her third pregnancy on July 19, 1963. Just 10 days after the delivery, on July 29, Triveni passed away due to pulmonary embolism. At that time, Triveni was just 35 years old.

Shaping the museum

Talking about her inspiration to preserve her mother’s life and work, Meera told The Federal, “I wanted to keep my mother’s legacy alive and enable visitors, especially those who know about her works to relive some of the moments of her life.”

According to Meera, the museum will house handwritten manuscripts of Triveni’s works, her personal diary, photographs, saris, medals and awards, her belongings, including her dressing and writing tables. “Belli Moda has to inspire other women writers. For this reason, I wanted to register her growth as a litterateur. My father had preserved all my mother’s belongings and handed them over to me when I returned from the US,” said Meera.

An anonymous donor, who was a fan of Triveni, extended financial support for the project. “My dream of developing a museum in memory of my mother was realised because of the support that came from various quarters. We are honoured to have expert architects, Pankaj Modi and Raghunath for the restoration, as the structure is delicate. Pankaj Modi is using lime, jaggery and bilva patra that are used for restoration of very old houses. We have specialised workers from places like Madhya Pradesh. Restoration takes time and cannot be a hurried exercise. In all probability, Belli Moda will be ready by the end of this year,” Meera said.

Meera has also created a 'Counselling Centre', as part of the museum, as most of Triveni’s novels deal with psychological issues, especially faced by women.

“This centre is the brainchild of Triveni’s granddaughter and my daughter Dr. Anusha Kumar, a clinical psychologist, pursuing post-doc higher studies in the US,” said Meera.