Tamrakar’sHalimali Sheds Light On Nepal Bhasa

Halimali, a collection of Nepal Bhasa essays on history, culture and creative writings, is a new book on the Nepalbhsha language and literature.

This is the fifth in a series of works Purna Tamrakar, a prolific author and one of the leaders of the Nepal Bhasa movement has produced thus far. Halimali in Nepal Bhasa means a package or rather collection of fried beans of various types, tastes and flavours that are used in the seasonal festivals as well as rituals of New culture.  

Nepal Bhasa is one of the oldest languages in Nepal. This language, according to Professor Manik Lal Shrestha has developed after the arrival of Lichchhavis into the Nepal valley some 1900 years ago. Since the 1920s, wrote the late Kamal Prakash Malla in an article written in 1971,

"Newar elites have been struggling to revive their language" as he explained, "determined to suppress all creative activities in Newari, the Ranas imprisoned and exiled several Newari writers and poets". 

Many recent scholars including the late Satya Mohan Joshi, Malla K Sunder,  Bal Gopal Shrestha and so on have substantiated this in their speeches and writings.

Tamrakar has summed up the experience of editing Nepal Bhasa publications such as Palistha and Thaunkanhe in recent years and is well known for his critical essays in the same language. He has in effect produced a mini encyclopaedia about the Newa culture and language through this collection. 

He has included factual descriptions, personal reflections and discourses related to Newa ethnic and religious identity, festivals, cultural history and the long history of Nepal Bhasa language and literature. He has left no stone unturned in these connections.

For instance, his first essay is about Ganesh, the Hindu god and his relationship with Newa culture. He traces its history right from the period before the Licchhavi era and relates it to the day-to-day rituals of Newars.

He narrates anecdotes and stories about the origins of Ganesh and Krishna basing themselves on Buddhist and Hindu scriptures. Thereafter, he describes the multiple faces of Ganesh and talks about how general people to royals worship this elephant-headed god.

In the later chapters, Tamrakar discusses historical documents including Gopal Banshawali, Shree Yangal and the hearsay evidence mentioned in Mahabharat in respect of how Kathmandu was named after Kasthamandap (wooden house).

He has dedicated a greater amount of his time to analysing the justifications for observing festivals, changes in cultures from time to time and the question of cultural deviation as well as transformation over the ages.

 He, however, does not leave out discussions relating to music, songs, stories, poems, epics, social anomalies including suppression of women so on and so forth in his essays. He starts with Siddhi Narsingh Malla's dramas and songs and moves ahead by throwing light on the progressive thoughts of the author to conclude that the king was a luminary in the ancient poetic sky of Nepal Bhasa. 

He then throws light on story writer Suwanandadas of Prithvi Narayan Shah's time and on poet Prana Mall, the King of Bhaktapur who ruled from 643-70 NS. He endorsed the generalization that Nepal Bhasa literature flourished significantly during the Malla period thereby citing the kings such as Siddhi Narsingh Malla, Pratap Malla, Jagat Chandra, Bhupatindra Malla, Shreeniwas Malla, Jagat Prakash Malla, Ranjit Malla, and Jayaprakash Malla as literary personalities of the frontline.

He recognizes the contribution of researcher Chhatra Bahadur Kayastha and lists other important references such as Dayaram Shrestha, Dhana Vaja Vajracharya , Janak Lal Vaidya and others for further study and research in this regard. He has covered the old songs of Thimi and Lubhu by way of survey and analysis. 

Other outstanding themes of Halimali are 'Contribution to Language made by the Great Poet Siddhidas', 'Role of Literary Magazines in the Development of Nepal Bhasha', 'Status and Trend of Progressive Literature in Nepal Bhasha' and 'Literature for whom?'. 'Story literature in Nepal Bhasha at a Glance' is no less elaborate. It is a well-articulated review substantiated by reliable references of authorities in the genre. 

This collection of his articles and reflections of Purna Tamrakar, I believe, can be a great source and reference material for the students and researchers of Newa language, literature, culture and to a great extent cultural anthropology thereon of Kathmandu Valley.