Dr Bhelkar gets DLitt for translating Gramgeeta in English

Dr Ratnakar Bhelkar

By Ajay Mardikar :

Second DLitt in English after Dr R N Roy

After a long gap of over four decades, the highest academic degree DLitt, in English, has been awarded by Rashtrasant Tukadoji Maharaj Nagpur University to Dr Ratnakar Deorao Bhelkar, Associate Professor in English with Dhanwate National College, Nagpur. Co-incidentally the subject of his writing in two volumes is related to Rashtrasant Tukadoji Maharaj’s Gramgeeta and the university awarding the degree is also named after the social reformer saint.

Dr Bhelkar, a bilingual writer and poet, has translated Tukadoji’s Gramgeeta in English with tradition and reality in the first volume. The spirit of content, style and aesthetic facets have been retained in the translation work. The diction rooted in Indian culture has been explained with footnotes and phrases and idioms explained. The translation of Gramgeeta in English is base for the Volume-II.

It cuts across the disciplines of translation studies, comparative studies, cultural studies, post-colonial studies. It also deals with vedic culture, post-vedic culture and post-colonial reality; Towards cosmic vision, Utopia and practicability, mass culture and society. Dr Bhelkar has highlighted the tradition of Indian devotional poetry and nationality which is essence of compositions of Rashtrasant Tukadoji Maharaj’s original work.

Gramgeeta emphasises on development of individual, village, to nation through various socially conscious efforts. Lucidity of language of Tukadoji Maharaj has been retained in the translation work by Dr Ratnakar and explanations written without touching the essence of the original work. Dr Bhelkar is the second recipient of DLitt in English, after Dr R N Roy, former Head of Department of English of Nagpur University. His research work was on scientific fiction. The second DLitt in English, after four decades, will be awarded in the next Convocation of the University.