Kailash Chandra Dash
Today is Gopal Chandra Praharaj’s 145th birth anniversary
On 27th September 1874 was born Gopal Chandra Praharaj, the illustrious compiler of ‘Purnachandra Odia Bhasakosh’ which is a lasting contribution to the development of Odia language and is a potential marker of Odia identity. We have an interesting account of Praharaj by RadhaCharan Panda which was selected by Utkal Sahitya Samaj as Gourishankar Prize in 1959.
Education
Praharaj Passed entrance examination in 1891 and completed IA in 1893. Sashibhushan Ray, the son of Radhanath Ray was his classmate. He wanted to be an engineer at first and was admitted in Sibapur College Calcutta but due to ill health he had to return and he read BA in Ravenshaw College Cuttack. He passed BA and BL and became a pleader under the training of Madhusudan Das. He had a great appreciation for Odia literature and culture. He had established in 1894 Haribhakti Pradayini Sikshya Bibarddhini Sabha in his village Siddheswarpur which was designed for educating the people in the rural areas.
Prominence
He came to prominence with his literary essays in UtkalSahitya edited by BiswanathKar. Then he became associated with the Utkal Sahitya Samaj in Cuttack which began from 1903 as the significant literary forum for Odia language and literature. He was credited with numerous literary works in Odia language like UtkalKahani, BaiMahantyPanji, Baaidasanka Bhajan O Sishu Geeta, BhagavataTungire Sandhya, Dhagadhamali Bachana, Amagharara Halchal, Bainaninka Bujuli, Nanaanka Bastani, and others. In Utkal Sahitya from 1903 to 1905 was serialized his interesting essay entitled Mia Sahebanka Rojanamacha. Utkal Sahitya provided enough opportunity to Praharaj to publish most of his essays. Besides in Rasachakra and Nababharata, his essays were also published.
Writing
In Nababharata edited by Nilakantha Das, he wrote in the name of Dhurmusa Dhumaa which was entitled as Swapanare Rajadhani Yoga. GopalPrajaraj in collaboration with Biswanath Kar and Dewanbahadur Srikrishna Mahapatra edited an Odia weekly from Cuttack in the 1930s which was Satya Samachar which was anti-Congress in nature and provided a critique on Gandhian strategy for the achievement of freedom. Most of his published works have recently compiled in volumes like Gopal Chandra Rachana Samagra by Dr. Gouranga Charan Dash and published by Vidyapuri Cuttack.
Bhasakosh
The most magnificent work of Gopal Chandra Praharaj was his compilation of Purna Chandra Odia Bhasakosh which is a great marker of Odia identity. This Bhasakosh has been digitized by Srujanika of Bhubaneswar which has led to its extraordinary popularity in the whole world as the comprehensive Odia lexicography. Girija Nandini Praharaj had got her doctorate on this Purnachandra Odia Bhasakosh in 1994 from Sambalpur University which presents a comprehensive analysis of it.
Genesis
The idea of his undertaking the compilation of a comprehensive Odia dictionary was first suggested to him W.W.Henderson (Principal Cuttack Training College) in 1913-1914. He busied himself in collecting Odiawords and idioms from Ganjam, Sambalpur, Singhhum, the feudatory States and from classical and modern writings. In 1917-18 the collected words were alphabetically arranged in note-books and memorandum slips. The compilation and writing of the manuscripts were begun in 1919. He had the support of his sister-in-law Pitambari Debi who busied herself for four years in collecting from original sources(the mouth of the people) proverbs, popular sayings, songs, and folk-tales. Praharaj was able to add at least 5000 popular and dialectical Odia words to his vocabulary.
Groundwork
This has been admitted by Praharaj in his Prospectus Specimen Forms and Orders Form of the Quadri-lingual Odia Bhasakosh presented to the Government of Bihar and Orissa in 1929. The draft groundwork was completed in 1927. It contained Odia words both provincial and literary and words incorporated in the language from other languages (English included) with their derivations and origin and their Odia and English meanings. Bengalee and Hindustanee synonyms of the Odia words were noted in the space left to the left hand below the main words. At the instance of Lambert, the DPI of Bihar and Orissa Province the manuscripts were examined by experts (including the Revd. Pike, London) who had pronounced the work to be a standard work of reference.
Appreciation
After finishing the draft groundwork he was engaged in revising the manuscripts thoroughly. Praharaj was able to get the support and cooperation of many Garjat chiefs of Odisha and Zamindars. It became famous as Purnachandra Odia Bhasakosh for the financial support of the Maharaja Mayurbhanja, Purnachandra Deo Bhanja. As early as 1937 Kabiguru Rabindranath Tagore was presented with a set of Odia Bhasakosh by Praharaj for which Tagore had a deep appreciation and which was preserved in Viswa Bharati Research Section.