Rare work penned by Poonthanam in Tamil Manipravalam recovered

Kozhikode: A rare work written by devotional poet Poonthanam 400 years ago was recovered. The work ‘Vasudevappattu’ is penned in Tamil Manipravalam. The work was recovered by Polish research fellow Dr Maciej Karasinski who arrived in Kerala for research purposes and Kozhikode Chalappuram native Dr G Sudev Krishna Sharma, a Sanskrit teacher at Wandoor GVMC School who obtained doctorate in Sanskrit from University of Calicut.

An article written by Maciej Karasinski and Sudev regarding the discovery and the importance of the book was published in ‘Journal of Indian Philosophy’ issued from Switzerland on March 1. They had collected digital copies of the palm leaf manuscripts from across the country. The rare work of Poonathanam was found when they studied the collection in Thrippunithura Sanskrit College.

There were arguments that Poonthanam had penned only Malayalam works. However, Ulloor S Prameswara Iyer, Dr V S Sharma and T Achutha Menon had mentioned about Tamil poems penned by Poonthanam. The newly recovered poems were examined by linguist Dr T B Venugopala Panicker and confirmed that they are written in pure Tamil Manipravalam.

As Poonthanam used to visit Guruvayur and Vaikom, he might have had touch with Tamil Vaishnava Sidhas and their literature, Venugopala Panicker said. Dr N P Vijayakrishnan also stated that there were houses of Tamil Brahmins near Angadippuram area where Poonthanam was living. This is considered as the reason for his knowledge in Tamil language.