From: “Swamy Venkatayogi” swamyv@gmail.com

We welcome you to the May-2008 issue of Pranahita.

May is the historical month of many struggles and movements. The International workers’ day is celebrated on May 1^st commemorating the workers’ solidarity and struggles for lesser work hours and better working conditions. The struggles of workers have given birth to wonderful literature all over the world enriching human culture and values to a large to a great extent.

May 19^th is the birthday of the great Telugu writer Chalam. Telugu literary lovers celebrate every Buddha Poornima as his birthday. Chalam is probably one of the greatest writers in not only Telugu but in all Indian languages. We don’t see a writer like him in any other Indian language. His writings broke the shackles of patriarchy that oppressed women for ages. In his writings,  Chalam strived for sexual liberation of women and opposed the reactionary values of the patriarchy. Pranahita salutes the great writer and pays homage to him.

This May marks the 40^th anniversary of the French Student movement that started off as a student protest but soon became a wild fire of 10 million workers’ strike that shook not only the entire France but the whole world. It led to the fall of de Gaulle’s government and lot of rights and facilities to the workers and students. The freedom personal and sexual that the youth enjoy today can be accounted back to the revolutionary French Student movement of 1968.

Also by this May the occupation of Palestine completes 60 years. The people of Palestine have been reeling under the gruesome occupation and have been made refugees in their own country and since then are people without a country. So much bloodshed has occurred and innumerable children, women and helpless have been massacred during the past 60 years. There has been enormous resistance and the people of Palestine have fought tooth and nail against the occupation. A significant amount of wonderful literature has been produced from the conflict reflecting human agony on both the sides.

In this issue of Pranahita we bring to you the powerful voices of poetry from Telugu women poets. Please read Ghantasala Nirmala ‘dAmpatyam paraspara hananam’ , Shilalolita ‘mATlADutunna sharIram’, Sujata Patwari ‘nIDala mATu‘, Mahe Jabeen ‘fasTu TerarisTu neksTu kamnUnisTu‘, Jvalita ‘oka jIvanmaraNa jIvadRshyam’, and hechchArkE ‘raati pustakam’ in the poetry section.

We carry short stories by konDEpUDi nirmala ‘prEma kAdA ayitE pichchaa’, Prashant ‘ukka’ and Peddinti Ashok Kumar ‘asOyi dUla’ in the ‘mAnETi kathalu’ series.

Please read the review of Charlapalli Swaroopa Rani’s ‘mankena pUvu’ by Shikhamani describing it as first dalit women poetry. Also please read the essay that introduces the compilation of articles on Vattilkota Alwar Swamy – ‘prajala maniShi vaTTikOTa aLwAr svaami saahitya jeevitam’ by Bellamkonda Sampath Kumar.

In the translations please read the translation of the next parts of ‘The Postman’ by N.Venugopal and ‘Lakota Women’ by Mamata.  Also please read in the column ‘chourastA’ by Himabindu – this time about vaccinations and the politics behind them.

In the literary news section please read the news about the release of the book ‘metuku sIma charitra – samskRti’.

We request you to patronize Paranahita as usual and provide valuable feedback.

Warm Regards,

Pranahita Editorial Commitee