Moturi Satyanarayana

Satyanarayana Moturi
Born	2 February 1902 Dondapadu, Krishna district, Andhra Pradesh
Died	March 6, 1995(1995-03-06) (aged 93)
Occupation	freedom fighter
Spouse(s)	Shrimati Suryakanta Devi

Satyanarayana Moturi (2 February 1902 – 6 March 1995) was an Indian freedom fighter alongside Mohandas Gandhi until 1947 and then a member of the Constituent Assembly of India which drafted the Indian Constitution. He was a nominated member of the Rajya Sabha (the Upper House in the Indian government) until 1966.^[1] He was instrumental in making Hindi an official language in the Indian Constitution, while tolerating the other major Indian languages. He devoted his later life to helping spread Hindi in South India.

Early life, Family, and Education

Moturi was born in Dondapadu village in the Krishna district of Andhra Pradesh, India. After his primary education, he studied English, Telugu, and Hindi at the National College in Machilipatnam, achieving a high proficiency in them. He joined the Dakshin Bharat Hindi Prachar Sabha as a volunteer and gradually became the Secretary and Principal Secretary of that organisation. A major mission in his life would be to efficiently promote the growth of Hindi in South India between 1936 and 1961. He married Shrimati Suryakanta Devi and had three sons and four daughters with her.

Activism in the Indian Independence Movement (1925–1947)

Moturi participated in Quit India Movement in 1942 and was jailed.

During this time, Moturi was an active promoter of the Hindi language. He was the Editor of "Hindi Pracharak" (1926–36), "Hindi Prachar Samachar" (1938–61) and Dakshina Bharat (1947–61). He organised many Institutions all over India such as "Dakshina Bharata Hindi Prachara Sabha" of Madras (1926–61). He was the Founding Secretary of "Telugu Basha Samithi" of Madras and Hyderabad.

Framer of the Indian Constitution (1948–50)

After India became independent from Britain, Moturi was a member of the Constituent Assembly of India from 1948–50. He served as a Member of the Drafting Committee of the Indian Constitution for its Language Section. He was a key figure in the divisive debates on: what to make the official language of India (Hindi, English, or a number of local languages such as Bengali, Telugu, Tamil, etc.); how to set up a pluralistic civil service examination system; and how to balance local languages with national languages at different levels of government.

Member of India's Parliament (1950–66)

After Indian Independence, from 1950–52, Moturi was a member of the Provisional Parliament of India as an MP. After the Indian Constitution was drafted, Moturi was nominated by the President of India as a Rajya Sabha (Upper House) member. He served twice between 1954 and 1966 (3 April 1954 to 2 April 1960 and 3 April 1960 to 2 April 1966). He was also a member of: the Madras Legislative Council (1952–54); the Central Advisory Board of Education of the Govt. of India; the Madras University Senate (1952–53); the Central Official Languages Commission (1954–56).

Scholarly Interests and Propagation of Hindi through India

Moturi had many scholarly interests. He was the Chief Editor of Encyclopedia on Social Sciences in Hindi published by the Hindi Vikas Samithi, Madras. He was the founding secretary of the Telugu Bhasha Samiti. He also founded the Hindi Vikas Samiti and published 'Vishwa Vignana Samhita.' Finally, Moturi was an editor for a comprehensive encyclopaedia published in his native language of Telugu.

Awards and Death

Later in his life, Moturi won many awards. He was a recipient of the Padma Shri award in 1954 and the Padma Bhushan award in 1962,^[2] both from the Government of India. Andhra University honoured him with its Kala Prapoorna award in 1977.

Moturi lived to the age of 93. When a family member asked the nonagenarian Moturi about the secret of his longevity, his brief response was: "Listen more, eat less."

Legacy

As an activist for Indian Independence, a framer of the Indian Constitution, and a Parliamentarian, Moturi was a key figure in India's political history. However, some people criticise his decision to support Hindi, and not English, as the official language of India. The awkward provisions in the Indian Constitution and a later push by pro-Hindi hardliners led to "language riots" in the 1960s in southern states such as Tamil Nadu, where more than 60 people died. Several students immolated themselves protesting the forced use of Hindi as the national language. While English has become the de facto national language of India by 2010, the Indian Constitution has continued to serve as the fundamental basis of the India's polity and society and its drafting was a major accomplishment.

References

Biographical Data of Satyanarayana Moturi
Luminaries of 20th Century, Potti Sreeramulu Telugu University, Hyderabad, 2005.
List of Rajya Sabha Members
Transcript of the Official Indian Language Debates of the Constituent Assembly of India, September 14, 1949
Debates on Language in the Indian Constitution

↑ "Nominated members since 1952". Rajya Sabha Secretariat, New Delhi. Retrieved 6 January 2012.
↑ "Padma Awards" (PDF). Ministry of Home Affairs, Government of India. 2015. Retrieved July 21, 2015.

Padma Bhushan award recipients (1960–69)

1960	Rabindra Nath Chaudhuri Nilakantha Das Raj Rajeshwardatt Shastri Dravid Kazi Nazrul Islam Hafiz Ali Khan Bal Krishna Sharma Naveen Ayyadevara Kaleswara Rao Acharya Shivpujan Sahay Vithal Nagesh Shirodkar Haridas Siddhanta Vagish

1961	Tridib Nath Banerjee Rustomji Bomanji Billimoria Seth Govind Das Verrier Elwin Niranjan Das Gulhati L. Venkatakrishna Iyer Rai Krishnadas Sumitranandan Pant Svetoslav Roerich Bhagwan Sahay Bindeshwari Prasad Verma Krishnaswami Venkataraman Ardeshir Ruttonji Wadia

1962	Ramaswamy Duraiswamy Ayyar Gyanesh Chandra Chatterjee Ramchandra Narayan Dandekar Prem Chandra Dhanda Asaf Ali Asghar Fyzee Bade Ghulam Ali Khan Jafar Ali Khan Daulat Singh Kothari Mithan Jamshed Lam Sudhansu Sobhan Maitra Sisir Kumar Mitra Tarabai Modak Radhakamal Mukerjee Sudhindra Nath Mukerjee Niaz Fatehpuri Jal R. Patel Narayan Sitaram Phadke V. Raghavan Dukhan Ram T. S. Soundram Mahankali Seetharama Rao Raghunath Saran Moturi Satyanarayana Sitaram Seksaria Santosh Kumar Sen Tarlok Singh Radhika Raman Sinha

1963	Narendra Nath Bery Makhanlal Chaturvedi Omeo Kumar Das Nitish Chandra Laharry Badri Nath Prasad Kanuri Lakshmana Rao Rahul Sankrityayan Ramanlal Gokaldas Saraiya T. R. Seshadri Sardar Harnarain Singh M. L. Soni Ramkumar Verma

1964	Sheikh Abdullah Nuruddin Ahmed Rafiuddin Ahmed Jacob Chandy Kunji Lal Dubey Tushar Kanti Ghosh Anil Bandhu Guha Mohd. Abdul Hai Dara Nusserwanji Khurody Anukul Chandra Mukherjee Jnanendra Nath Mukherjee Bhole Nath Mullik R. K. Narayan Chintaman Govind Pandit Tribhuvandas Kishibhai Patel Bal Gandharva T. N. Ramachandran Khushwant Lal Wig

1965	Krishnaswami Balasubramanai Iyer Jogesh Chandra Banerjee Joginder Singh Dhillon Appasaheb Patwardhan Bhalchandra Babaji Dikshit P. O. Dunn Narasinh Narayan Godbole Nawang Gombu Sonam Gyatso Kashmir Singh Katoch Akbar Ali Khan S. L. Kirloskar Mohan Singh Kohli Pratap Chandra Lal Mohammad Mujeeb Jayant Narlikar Ramaswamy Rajaram K. R. Ramanathan Satyajit Ray Triguna Sen Santu Jouharmal Shahaney Shiv Sharma Harbaksh Singh Vrindavan Lal Verma Manikya Lal Verma

1966	T. S. Ramaswami Aiyer Babubhai Maneklal Chinai Puliyur Krishnaswamy Duraiswami Verghese Kurien Zubin Mehta K. P. Kesava Menon Bhabani Charan Mukharji Mannathu Padmanabha Pillai K. Shankar Pillai Vikram Sarabhai Vinayak Sitaram Sarwate Homi Sethna Jodh Singh Haribhau Upadhyaya

1967	Mulk Raj Anand Tara Cherian Mulk Ra Chopra Tulsi Das Krishna Kanta Handique Akshay Kumar Jain Pupul Jayakar Ali Akbar Khan D. P. Kohli Ramanathan Krishnan C. K. Lakshmanan T. M. Ponnambalam Mahadevan Kalyanji Vithalbhai Mehta S. I. Padmavati Vasantrao Bandoji Patil D. C. Pavate Datto Vaman Potdar B. Shiva Rao Khwaja Ghulam Saiyidain Asoke Kumar Sarkar Mihir Sen Ravi Shankar Kaikhushru Ruttonji Shroff M. L. Vasanthakumari

1968	Acharya Vishva Bandhu Prabhu Lal Bhatnagar Sudhir Ranjan Sengupta Mary Clubwala Jadhav K. Shivaram Karanth Bismillah Khan Vishnu Sakharam Khandekar Sam Manekshaw Mansukhlal Atmaram Master M. G. K. Menon Waman Bapuji Metre Gujarmal Modi Murugappa Channaveerappa Modi Gopalan Narasimhan Benjamin Peary Pal Brahm Prakash Manikonda Chalapathi Rau C. R. Rao Radhanath Rath Jyotish Chandra Ray Mariadas Ruthnaswamy Firaq Gorakhpuri Shripad Damodar Satwalekar G. Sankara Kurup Periyasaamy Thooran Sarda Prasad Varma Shamaprasad Rupshanker Vasavada Mamidipudi Venkatarangayya

1969	Tarasankar Bandyopadhyay Krishna Chandar Rahim-ud-in Khan Dagar Mohanlal Lallubhai Dantwala Keshavrao Krishnarao Datey Keshav Prasad Goenka Semmangudi Srinivasa Iyer Vithalbhai Jhaveri Prithviraj Kapoor Kesarbai Kerkar Krishna Kripalani Adinath Lahiri Gobind Behari Lal Kasturbhai Lalbhai Lata Mangeshkar V. K. Narayana Menon Raman Madhavan Nair Saghar Nizami Nanasaheb Parulekar Yashwant Dinkar Pendharkar Vitthal Laxman Phadke Raja Rao Niharranjan Ray Prafulla Kumar Sen Vallabhadas Vithaldas Shah Haroon Khan Sherwani Kasturiswami Sreenivasan Naval Tata S. S. Vasan

1954–59 1960–69 1970–79 1980–89 1990–99 2000–09 2010–19

Padma Shri awards

1954–59 1960–69 1970–79 1980–89 1990–99 2000–09 2010–19

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