Saturday, January 24, 2015

Mama Ramayanayana

                                                                 Mama  Ramayanayana
                                                   ( My story   of  Ramayana- A three year saga. )
                                           A humble request   to  my  friends , fans  and admirers.

     I would like to jot a few  lines  regarding me   and the story of Rama. It was from my father that  I learnt  the Ekasloki Ramayana

Aadho Rama thapo vananu gamanam, Hathwa mrugam kanchanam,
Vaidehi haranam, jatayu maranam, Sugreeva sambhashanam,
Bali nigrahanam, samudhra tharanam, Lanka pureem dahanam,
Paschad Ravana Kumbha karna madanam, Ethat ithi Ramayanam

Once Rama went to forest,
He chased the deer,
Sitha was kidnapped,
Jatayu was killed,
There were talks with Sugreeva,
Bali was killed,
The sea was crossed,
Lanka was burnt,
And later Ravana and Kumbha karna,
Were also killed.
This in short is the story of Ramayanam.

    It was again from him as a baby that  I heard  the story of Ramayana .It was possibly in the fifth standard that  I learnt the Sri Ramodantham  , the story of Ramayana   which strangely started   from  the birth of   Ravana to Visravas and from then on I have been   reading   several Ramayana books  in several versions. I found  that the greatness  of Rama as a human being attracted me a lot  . In 2000  when I started   translating stotra rathnas  , I stumbled   on  several stotras(prayers) based  on this great story . Some of them  are:-

4.Rama Narayana Sthuthi (Malayalam ) - http://stotraratna.sathyasaibababrotherhood.org/ra19.htm

                                                  I had also earlier translated  an Upanishad called  Rama Rahsya Upanishad (http://www.celextel.org/upanishads/atharva_veda/ramarahasya.html )   which  is the part of the Vedas and which extols the greatness  of Rama , indicating that  the holy name “Rama”   was much ancient than  Ramayana itself. Recently  God Rama   wanted me    to translate   three versions of Ramayana.   They were:-

1.Translation of Adhyathma Ramayana   from Malayalam.
       It was  in April   2012   that one of my friends   requested  me to translate  Adhyathma  Ramayana  of Thunjathu Ezhuthachan from Malayalam , which was itself a translation from Sanskrit, so that  it can be read during the Karkidaga Masa.It had 6 Kandams , 119 chapters  and 4200   verses.  I took it up for translation and completed  it in  4  months. http://rajathathas.blogspot.in/. Later I found that  I was the  only   who has translated   this great book   in to English and put in the web .My search also indicates   that  though there is an English book translating   Adhyathma Ramayanam    from Sanskrit    to English, there was no translation of this  extremely popular  Malayalam book.This Ramayana is a transcreation of Valimiki Ramayana  supposed to be  authored by the great Veda Vyasa. Rama  by that time was considered as   full  Avathara of Vishnu    and there are more than ten prayers addressed  to Rama  by various characters of Rama including  Kousalya,  Khara, Khabanda, Sabari and so on  .  And the first great Malayalam poet translated   in to Malayalam  poem , as if  it was related by a parrot .Even today a copy of this   book is  preserved like a treasure   by every Hindu Malayali  in his home  . It is read every year   with great reverence in the Karkidaga montha fondly called by Malayalis as   the “Ramayana  month”.

2.Translation of Valmiki Ramayanam from Sanskrit.
   It was in the month of April 2013  that   my friend Sri Lakshmanan   of Celextel   who requested me to take up  the translation  of Valmiki Ramayanam in to English  . I was reluctant . I told him    that I may not live to see its completion but I started  translating  it and  completed it by August 2014. This great book had   24000 verses  in six Kandas with  534  chapters  ,  the great epic  already there were 6-7 translations   available in the web. Here are a few of them:-
THree volumes
Translation  verse by verse
Translation  by  Ralph T.H.Griffith
Another  great translation
Another great  translation
Another translation in English verse

      It is very important to note That    sage Valmiki was a contemporary of Rama ,In fact Rama met him while going to Dandakaranya.  When he was searching for a   suitable hero  for writing an epic , sage Narada    suggested Rama  as the suitable hero. The meter of what he wrote was  based on the  wailing of a female Krouncha bird when its mate    was killed by  a hunter .There is not a single instance of prayer   addressed to Rama in the entire book .People do respect him  but  they do not pray him.  The only prayer in that book is Adithya Hrudayam addressed to the Sun God  . No temples are indicated any where .There is a mention of Sandhya Vandana   being performed by Sita .  When Rama wants to do obsequies to his late father   , he offers fruits and meat available in the forest as the sacrificial offering   . A pooja of housewarming   was conducted by killing a deer  .I am telling all these things to indicate   that Rama was considered   as a  human being and the worship in temples had not  become popular at that time .This book also has a very detailed description of the geography of India   and very detailed listing of its flora.
My translation can be found in

3.Translation of Kamba Ramayana   from Tamil
   Kamban considered as the   emperor among poets in Tamil   is supposed to have lived in 8th centaury AD.  He was essentially a   poet rather than a story teller. His trancreation of Valmiki Ramayana  , which he preferred to call it as Ramavatharam (The incarnation of Rama)  was perhaps the first epic that   was translated  in to Tamil.  It has 10368 verses   in 95 chapters of six Kandas.Though he acknowledges the source of the story to Valmiki , he had almost rewritten the story. As a Tamil poet , he followed the  great traditions of Tamil Grammar  in writing an epic. A great philanthropist   called  THiruvennai  Nallur Chadayappa Vallal   financed his venture .The grateful Kamba mentions about him   in various places in the epic.In fact he is picturized as the one   who  handed over the crown to sage Vasishta  during carnation of Rama  .The great poet could never   leave out any chance for  pretty long descriptions in various places .He mentions that  Kausalya went to the temple of Ranganatha (the family deity of Dasaratha)   as soon as she heard   about Coronation of Rama  . He made   various changes in the story of Valmiki  . People believe that there    were various protests   when he wanted to dedicate it  Lord Ranganatha of  Sri Rangam   temple . There is a belief  that he was compelled    to get certificates from various learned people for doing that  , There is also a story that   the king   did not want Kamban to   use words which people do not commonly use. Kamban changed the names of  all the characters  of Ramayana to suit the limited alphabetical list in Tamil as well as to  suit the Tamil Grammar. Ofcourse he had  borrowed certain  meters of poem writing from Sanskrit in certain places  . My translation of Kamban’s   great epic  was started in the month of  January 2014  and had been completed   on !5th  January  2015 and this can be found in
    There are no on line references of English translation of Kamba Ramayanam available in the web   and  though many people have started doing it. Most of the prose translation available are  abridged versions of the original  . I found a reference saying that so far  only the first 4000   verses have been translated in to English.
     This journey of mine   in the great ocean of Ramayana    spanning for three long years had  almost changed my personality. Due to age whenever , I did not feel confidant  , I used to ask  my friends in the face  book and  in google plus to pray for me  .Not only they did but wrote to me  encouraging me  .My grateful thanks to all of them.
    I do not  guarantee   total freedom from mistakes  in these translations because I did all alone   and I again was the only one who proof read it . I request   that my future generation of youngsters to whom I wrote this , read it , correct  it  and further improve it .Here is the greatest wealth of India  which I am passing to you all with the hope and request that   you  would preserve  and improve the treasure further  and  pass it on to your next generation. I would like to thank God Rama and his  great devotee Hanuman  for choosing  an ordinary person like me to do this job.May God bless you all .






Sunday, January 18, 2015

75 years and one day-thanks

Today I am 75 years and one day old.For past one month my daughter Meera had called all my friends, relations , classmates , colleagues individually and requested them to write about me .My grand daughters and grand sons have made photo art to the entire book. And this book was presented to me by them yesterday.I know that people /families who consult me for astrology have very high regard for me , people who read my translations have become great fans for me, statisticians all over the world working in tree genetics consider me as a great genius but I never knew that my own children , grand children, brother , sister, relations, friends and colleagues shower so much love and affection on me. I read whatever they have written several times with eye full of tears. I have to thank my pretty daughter who is herself mother of two lovely kids , but who i s still considered as a kid by me for the invaluable compilation and thank all my children for drowning me with their affection and love and made me speechless. I have to thank my younger brother and sister , who want to be born as my brother and sister in the next birth also, and thank my closest friends Sivadas and Balaramamurthy for recalling our great friendship and my all other relations for the great affectionate jottings. I cannot give any thing back to them except my undiluted love.May God bless all of them...May the great God bless all of them.because their happiness is mine also.
My wife Jayalakshmi has never ever written about me. She has written a page about my good qualities.How can I thank her .After all she is a part of me.

Friday, January 16, 2015

I dedicate all my work done after retirement to

I dedicate all my work done after retirement to
My efforts in the last few days in highlighting my hobbies were intended in making all of you aware of the work done by me as also to encourage people who are retiring to take up some hobby like these so that they never feel that “They are not wanted by anyone.”
All that I do has been made possible only by the blessing of God. I always consider that He in his great majesty, composes what needs to be done and I am but his key board. The key board being constantly engaged does not get bored and wants to thank God by offering Him , crores of Pranams to him for choosing it . I do not know about the quality of my work but the sheer quantity of what I have done amazes even me.
My wife Smt.Jayalakshmi . my partner in Dharma has been great source of inspiration to me , through thick and thin. She understands that I get pleasure in doing what I do and never disturbs me from what I have been doing, even when I some times work for eight hours per day.
But for her and the blessings of God I would not have been able to do this immense amount of work. Side by side I have been trying my best to look after my obligations in running my little family too. Whenever I do not attend to it properly what else can I tell her except the pretty lines,
I have the shell and the pearl within it but I do not have time to open it,
I have the words , I have the meter but I do not have time to write a poem.
All my work before 60 were dedicated to my office and today when I am 75, I want to dedicate all the work done by me after 60 to my dear wife Smt.Jayalakshmi .

Thursday, January 15, 2015

After Retirement hobbies -7

After  reiiremebt hobbies  -7
     This is really the last section  about some items that  I have left out.  I have written two great essays on  the rituals involved  in Iyer marriages   and on pilgrimage   to Benares    and Rameswaram , after  pain staking research. You can read them in
   I Have translated all the stories of king Vikramadithya   given in Periya Ezhuthu Vikramadithan Kadhai  . These very interesting stories can be seen  in
  I have illustrated   100 Malayalam proverbs   by   stories ,


   Apart from these in these fifteen years I have contributed lot of tid bits  which are not very great

Wednesday, January 14, 2015

After retirement hobbies -6

After  retirement hobbies -6
    I always  had a great regard   to our religion .Due to my interactions    with younger generation  , I found that  our greatest export commodity is them. Most of them  have great regard for our rituals but are not able to do    simple things like Sandhya Vandanam    ,THarpanam and Avani Avittam due   to the non availability on manthras    to them   in the language most of them know , that is English . They were  not aware  of  the rules of life governing a life of a Brahmin. I did attempt to get Vaidhyanatha Deekshitheeyam    the authoritative book in Sanskrit  , I located  it   on line but it was very difficult to read it as it was a Xerox copy of a  very old manuscript.  It was  at this time that  I came to know that Mahaperiyavaa  , in his great   wisdom   had entrusted   the job of  properly   summarizing of this great book   to a great Scholar called Manjakudi Venkatrama Satrigal  and this was published  in Tamil  by Heritage Educational Trust  in Mylapore and according to the wishes of Mahaperiyavaa  it was   being sold at  a subsidized price  . Maha Periyavaa  in his gret wisdom  also had ordered   the publishers that   there should not be any copy right to     this great  book. I bought the book and translated   it word by word and put it  in   my blog. I also added Manthras  for Trivedi Sandhyavandhanam  with necessary modifications    for Vadakalai   and Then Kalai Iyengars  , Amavasai Tharpanam for Yajur Vedam (Iyers as well as Iyengars)  , Bodhayana THarpana Manthras  , Avani avittam manthras separately    for   all the three Vedas , Several books on rules of Behaviour  for Sadacharam,  etc. Every year for the past fifteen years  I have been putting  The sankalpa manthras   for Amavasya THarpanam   for every year with modifications for different countries, Avani avitta Manthras    for   three  Vedas every year and so on.  These Manthras are accessed  by several thousands of people   every year,. My heart  fills up   with joy of helping people after    every Avani Avittam when thousands of people thank me  . I am getting old but I am determined   to keep this service as long God  keeps me healthy  with the blessings of Mahaperiyava . The blog where you can find all this information is

Tuesday, January 13, 2015

After Retirement Hobbies 5

After   retirement  hobbies-5
   I have always been fascinated by    the small but clean and devotion drenched temples  of Kerala, to which state  I belong . So after   collecting information by reading   and personal enquiry   wrote  in great detail about 100   temples of Kerala.  I came across temples which I had   not known earlier. There was a  temple for the Divine Brahmam,  temples for  all the four sons of  Dasaratha, a temple to Duryodhana   etc. This kept on engaging me as  collection of information    sitting in Bangalore   was very difficult .Please read   about them in
  Another group of temples that fascinated me were    the temples of Village Gods of Tamil Nadu  .Fortunately by reading many magazine articles as well as   few  well written books  I could get detailed information of 102   such temples. Collection  of information was indeed difficult  and occupied   lot of my time. Those   interested  may read about them in

Monday, January 12, 2015

After Retirement hobbies-4

After  Retirement hobbies-4
    All my life  I habe been voracious and compulsive reader. I started reading books when I was  ten years of age . This made me a story teller of great repute to children. Atl east 6 of those children who were  pestering  me for stories    are members  of face book. During one of  my trips   to USA  ,when I was reading fairy tales  of Grimm, suddenly I recollected   several stories  that I knew, which reflected the Indian culture.  I started typing them all. Then I recollected that  I was   greatly dissatisfied  by the western rhymes   that  were being taught to our children. I started    writing  rhymes similar to them  from the Indian   angle  and also started collecting   rhymes from Indian languages that I knew.When I came back  , my  daughter  designed  a web site to put all my work .She wanted me to write small stotras addressed to different God’s   with their meaning   syuitable for Hindu children. I got a brain wave to add stories from Upanishads   and stories illustrating principles of Gita. This material    was put in a web site and  it was called  Raja Thatha’s corner because  the name I was well known in my family circles was Raja and I had become a Thatha. This great web site brought a huge fan following to me of  children and parents  of children. Among all the works that I have done  this is  became very dear to my heart. I know  none of you are children but I am sure   you would enjoy reading them in

Sunday, January 11, 2015

After retirement hobbies-3

After    retirement Hobbies-3
    Though not a musician or a musicologist  I was always fascinated  by  Carnatic musc  But  though  it is  great to hear   , I found it difficult to understand   the Sahithyam (lyrics)  of  most   of the songs sung during a music programme. One reason  was   due to language and another   was due to the technique involved in singing. For example  I could easily understand the songs sung in Tamil at the end of the Cutcheries , About  6 years  back I got a book by Brahmasri Balakrishna Sastrigal giving meanings of selected   songs of Thygaraja . I was enchanted   amd when I heard     those songs next time  I  could   understand them. I used the book initially   to translate  those Keerthanas in to English and put them in my blog  .  The response was great   and so I took the hobby of translating Carnatic Music Krithis    written  in Telugu, Tamil, Sanskrit, Malayalam  , Kannada   and Hindi in to English  Whenever    I was not able to understand some   of my on line  friends  helped me . So far I have translated 1000 krithis written in these 6 languages. Recently I got a friend   to translate ten Abhangs   of  Saint THukaram  written in Marathi  .My translation also includes   translation of Musical  Dramas-Nandanar Charithram     and Gayathri Puranam. I propse   to continue   this hobby of mine.  Any one who can translate  , please do so and send it to me   so that I can put it in my blog

http://translationsofsomesongsofcarnticmusic.blogspot.in/


May God bless all of you.


Saturday, January 10, 2015

After retirement hobbies-2


After  Retirement hobbies-2
     I retired  on 30th January  2000. I was a well  known statistician  who has made   very significant contributions  to Statistics.  This was  possible  due to my innate  curiosity  and  capacity    to hard work,Whenever  I use to recite   any Stotra   , I used to wonder  what it means. After retirement   the few books that I purchased   by Anna  , the legend in translation of   Stotras in to Tamil  , So after   translating in to English a  few simple stotras   which were   easy to understand  , I started   translating Vishnu Sahasranama ofcourse    with the constatnt reference to Anna’s great book.I did a not bad translation  clearly aiming   at the future generation  of Hindus who may not know  their mother toungue   or  Sanskrit.  I also decided that   I would   give the simple meaning and not   the Goodartha.  By 2002, I had    translated  about 20 Stotras ,  which included Vishnu Sahasranam, Nama Ramayanam , Annapurnashtakam  and during my visit to USA  in 2002  , My daughter in law Sangeetha created   a web site for me to put them (  http://members.tripod.com/english_stotras/eng_stotra.htm). The   response was great  . One of those  readers from Mumbai  adviced me to    create   a web site using Geocities. I did  and a new web site   called  was created and maintained by me.( http://www.geocities.com/ramya475)  After returning to India,  I started work at a  furious pace  , By another   4 years I had translated about 400 stotras   written in   Tamil, Malayalam,  Sanskrit   and Hindi.   I   bought many Malayalam  and Tamil books   and also downloaded   several     stotras.  IN 2009    all geocities web sites   were closed  .In the mean while  I  contacted sri Lakshmanan www.celextel.org/  , who gladly agreed  
To put my translations in his web site  HE also requested me to translate some  21 upanishads. The SAthya SAibaba brotherhood of Jolland and  Hindupedia     agreed   to put my translations in their web sites. I also  started using the Google blog under name  of   http://stotrarathna.blogspot.in/

 and started  posting my translations there  . As  of now  I have translated  around 1000 stotra  rathnas which include   several great books   and  this is visited by around 1000  people a day . I spend about   4-5  hours  daily on my translation job.  I am doing it all alone   with no one    to even read the proofs . I have several fans  my translations   ofcourse   there are critics also.  Hope this  hobby  would   keep me  busy   for some more time to come.  two of my translations have been published   by Giri traders, Madras Ofcourse  I also have more hobbies.

Friday, January 9, 2015

After retirement hobbies-1

After retirement  hobbies -1
       Al my official life was spent    as a  scientist  in  Indian Council of Agricultural Research. I retired in  2000 January. Then I had gone to USA to be with my daughter.It was at this  I came to know Sri Murugavel, , the founder  of Bharath Matrimony  , who was at that   running a web site called www,sysindia.com.  Since he knew  that I was doing   matching of horoscopes for matrimony  , he suggested to me to  help   people using my knowledge. He thought that people in USA  were finding it difficult to get match horoscopes and  were  forced to wait  more than a month   for getting that done. Since I had  a lot of time in my hand I agreed    to do that   and the first announcement   regarding  my availability   to match horoscopes came in tamilmatrimony.com.  Soon another web site   called cyberkerala also agreed to put my  availability. With   free software   available   for horoscope matching , later tamilmatrimony removed    the announcement but it is still there   in

     I  am still doing it in a small scale   due  to my   preoccupation with other hobbies as well rising  old age. Several people who have benefitted by my services    are  my face book friends. 

Completed Kamba Ramayana Translation in to English

It was   in the month of April 2012 , I started     translating Adhyathma Ramayana   from Malayalam   which has about 4000    verses and I completed it in  4 months,A very interesting  incident   happened then. Please read about it in
 Later at the suggestion of Sri Lakshmanan of Celextel , I did the translation  of Vamiki Ramayanam  from Sanskrit which consists of 24000 verses and I completed this job    in about 8 months  . I was relaxing after this   and then I thought I also should do the translation of Kamba Ramayanam from Tamil  and I started this job in March 2014 .In July when had completed    the five Kandas which occupied the   about 2000   verses and started   the translation of   the Yidha Kanda     which consists of 6000  verses,  due to my age  and  the difficult   poetical text , I felt very nervous and requested    all my on line  friends for  praying  for me. They all did and today  I have    completed  the first draft   of my translation of  this great book. I would be correcting it and uploading   it in another few days.

    I earnestly believe that   this work is not done by me   but God    did it through me.