Dayaram
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Dayaram (1777–1853) was a Gujarati poet of medieval
Gujarati literature The history of Gujarat, Gujarati literature () may be traced to 1000 AD, and this literature has flourished since then to the present. It is unique in having almost no patronage from a ruling dynasty, other than its composers. Gujarat Vidhya S ...
and was the last poet of the pre-British Gujarati school. He is known in
Gujarati literature The history of Gujarat, Gujarati literature () may be traced to 1000 AD, and this literature has flourished since then to the present. It is unique in having almost no patronage from a ruling dynasty, other than its composers. Gujarat Vidhya S ...
for his literary form called ''garbi'', a lyric song. He was a follower of
Pushtimarg The Puṣṭimārga, also known as Pushtimarg (Path of Nourishing or Flourishing) or Vallabha Sampradāya, is a Hindu Vaiṣṇava saṁpradāya. It was established in the early 16th century by Vallabha (1479–1530) and further developed by his ...
of
Hindu Hindus (; ; also known as Sanātanīs) are people who religiously adhere to Hinduism, also known by its endonym Sanātana Dharma. Jeffery D. Long (2007), A Vision for Hinduism, IB Tauris, , pp. 35–37 Historically, the term has also be ...
Vaishnavism Vaishnavism () ), also called Vishnuism, is one of the major Hindu denominations, Hindu traditions, that considers Vishnu as the sole Para Brahman, supreme being leading all other Hindu deities, that is, ''Mahavishnu''. It is one of the majo ...
. Dayaram, along with
Narsinh Mehta Narsinh Mehta, also known as Narsinh Bhagat, was a 15th-century poet-saint of Gujarat, India, honored as the first poet, or ''Adi Kavi,'' of the Gujarati language. Narsinh Mehta is member of Nagar Brahman community. Narsinh became a devotee of ...
and Meera, is considered a major contributor during the
Bhakti movement The Bhakti movement was a significant religious movement in medieval Hinduism that sought to bring religious reforms to all strata of society by adopting the method of Bhakti, devotion to achieve salvation. Originating in Tamilakam during 6t ...
in Gujarati literature.


Biography

Dayārām was born on 16 August 1777 in Chanod on the bank of the
Narmada River The Narmada River, previously also known as ''Narbada'' or anglicised as ''Nerbudda'', is the 5th longest river in India and overall the longest west-flowing river in the country. It is also the largest flowing river in the state of Madhya Prade ...
. He was born as the second son of Prabhurām and Mahālakṣmī into a Sāṭhodarā
Nagar Brahmin Nagar Brahmin is a Brahmin subcaste from the Indian state of Gujarat. Author T. Sasaki writes, amongst Brahmins of Gujarat, Nagar Brahmins were the most prominent subdivision in the political, economic and social relation, social activities o ...
family who belonged to the Śāṅkhāyaṇa śākhā of the R̥gveda. His siblings, elder sister Ḍāhīgaurī and younger brother Maṇiśaṅkar, died at the age of nine and two, respectively. His father was a clerk. He had very little education, and he was interested in devotional songs of the Vaishnava temple. At the age of eight, he had his yajñopavīta and was married, but his wife died after two years of marriage. His father arranged his second marriage with a
bride-price Bride price, bride-dowry, bride-wealth, bride service or bride token, is money, property, or other form of wealth paid by a groom or his family to the woman or the family of the woman he will be married to or is just about to marry. Bride dowry ...
of six hundred rupees. However, the marriage never went through as his father would die when Dayāśaṅkar was ten and his mother, too, died two years later. He then resided with his maternal uncle, Raghunātha in Ḍabhoi and Chanod. In the nearby village of Karanali, an ascetic named Keśavānand was living, and Dayārām requested to be his student. Keśavānand, at first, rejected him, but later admitted him after Dayārām made a satirical poem criticising him. Dayārām as a boy was mischievous; he and a group of friends would tease women collecting water at the river and throw stones at their pots. Once Dayārām broke a goldsmith's wife's pot which was on her head, and she demanded to be compensated. Dayārām, having no money to pay, fled the village and the goldsmith's wrath, with the local villagers believing he committed suicide in the Narmadā. At the age of fourteen in the village of Tenatalāv, he met a Puṣṭimārga scholar named Icchārām Bhaṭṭajī. Icchārām encouraged him to travel across India on a pilgrimage of religious places, and travelled for fourteen years until settling back in Dabhoi at the age of twenty-six. His contact with Icchārām Bhaṭṭajī turned him to his religious interest. Later he would visit the four Dhāmas. He visited Nāthadvārā, the most central Puṣṭimārga site and location of Śrīnāthajī, seven times and drank the water of the Yamunā River four times. At Nāthadvāra gave a eulogy of Śrīnāthajī so impressive that the Māhārāj gave him an expensive scarf from Banāras. Once after visiting Mahākaleśvara in
Ujjain Ujjain (, , old name Avantika, ) or Ujjayinī is a city in Ujjain district of the Indian state of Madhya Pradesh. It is the fifth-largest city in Madhya Pradesh by population and is the administrative as well as religious centre of Ujjain ...
he was travelling to
Nasik Nashik, formerly Nasik, is a city in the northern region of the Indian state of Maharashtra situated on the banks of the river Godavari River, Godavari, about northeast of the state capital Mumbai. Nashik is one of the Hindu pilgrimage sit ...
he and his pilgrim party was ambushed by bandits in a jungle disguised as pilgrims. Three people were killed and the rest kidnapped. The chief robber was a Marāṭha named Mānājī Angre who demanded five hundred rupees as ransom for Dayārām. Dayārām composed a poem about his trouble which he sang for three days until he was freed by Mānājī and given fifteen rupees. In
Tirupati Tirupati () is a city in the Indian States and territories of India, state of Andhra Pradesh and serves as the administrative headquarters of Tirupati district. It is known for its significant religious and cultural heritage, being home to th ...
at the shrine of Bālājī the Mahant or head of the shine was in the habit of kidnapping and extorting money from pilgrims. When Dayārām escaped at night he was recaptured he was not released until the Mahant was certain Dayārām was insolvent. Once in Baroda, his disciples Raṇachoḍbhāī and Girijāśaṅkar were singing his poems accompanied with tambūrā and tablā in public in Dayārām's presence. A Bāvā or ascetic pointed out a mistake Girijāśaṅkar made on the rhythm when playing the tablā, but Dayārām dismissed the mistake as minor. The Bāvā claimed that any competent musician wouldn't make such a mistake. Dayārām then challenged him to play the tablā to his singing, and the match continued the entire night until Dayārām sang a lyric so complex the Bāvā made a mistake. Dayārām, though having beaten the Bāvā, gave him his golden necklace worth roughly three hundred rupees. While Dayārām remained a bachelor throughout his life, he found companionship at the age of forty-six with Ratanbāī, a forty-five-year-old former child widow of a goldsmith caste. The pair lived together with Dayārām preparing the meals due to his higher caste. Dayārām claimed that she had been his wife in a former life. When he had fallen sick in 1842, he created a will in which he left her twenty five rupees out of the six hundred he had to his name. When he later died in 1853, he left her one thousand rupees worth of gold jewelry, but the ornaments were stolen by his relatives instead and she spent the last fourteen years of her life in poverty. He was initiated into
Pushtimarg The Puṣṭimārga, also known as Pushtimarg (Path of Nourishing or Flourishing) or Vallabha Sampradāya, is a Hindu Vaiṣṇava saṁpradāya. It was established in the early 16th century by Vallabha (1479–1530) and further developed by his ...
(''Brahmasambandha'') in A.D. 1803-04 by Gosvāmī Vallabhalālajī of the Vanamāḷījī temple in
Nathdwara Nathdwara is a city in the Rajsamand district of the state of Rajasthan, India. It is located in the Aravalli hills, on the banks of the Banas River and is 48 kilometres north-east of Udaipur. Shrinathji, is a swarup of lord Krishna whic ...
. However, he sometimes had disputes with the Mahārājas of the sect. Once when his guru Puruṣottamajī Mahārāja of Bundi-Kotah came to Ḍabhoi rumours reached him that Dayārām was short-tempered and should be banned from the local temple. Puruṣottam agreed to this and in response Dayārām composed verses criticising him. When Puruṣottam went to meet him at his house, Dayārām threw his tulsī kaṁṭhī at him after which the Mahārāj apologised and personally put the kaṁṭhī back on his neck. On another occasion a Mahārāja had come to Dabhoi and Dayārām was invited to pay respects. However Dayārām would only go on the condition that his seat would not be lower than that of the Mahārāja. The Mahārāja grudgingly agreed, but when the time came the seat that Dayārām was going to sit on was removed. A furious Dayārām then tore up his tulsī necklace and left. Due to this incident he stopped receiving money from a Puṣṭimārga patron. Dayārām notably lacked financial responsibility. Annually, he earned two hundred rupees through gifts. Once Dayārām decided to hold a caste dinner, so his contacts sent him in total two thousand rupees to pay for the event, but he ended up spending four thousand rupees. Every day he would eat thirty to forty betel leaves, and would only wear the finest and most expensive clothes. Once when his tailor sewed his aṅgarkhuṁ too tight in the shoulders, Dayārām threw his pen and ink stand at him.


Works

Dayaram was the last poet of the old Gujarati school. Most of his works are written in a literary form called ''garbi'', a lyric song. Dayaram was a devotional poet and was a follower of "Nirgun bhakti sampraday" (Pushti sampraday) in Gujarat. So he gave many garbi describing
Krishna Krishna (; Sanskrit language, Sanskrit: कृष्ण, ) is a major deity in Hinduism. He is worshipped as the eighth avatar of Vishnu and also as the Supreme God (Hinduism), Supreme God in his own right. He is the god of protection, c ...
. He used many literary, poetic forms to express his devotion. He also wrote long narrative poems based on the incidents on the
Mahabharata The ''Mahābhārata'' ( ; , , ) is one of the two major Sanskrit Indian epic poetry, epics of ancient India revered as Smriti texts in Hinduism, the other being the ''Ramayana, Rāmāyaṇa''. It narrates the events and aftermath of the Kuru ...
, such as ''Rukmani Vivah'' (Marriage of
Rukmini Rukmini (, ) is a Devi, Hindu goddess and the first queen of Krishna. She is described as the chief of Krishna's wives in Dvārakā. Rukmini is revered as the avatar of Lakshmi and is venerated primarily in Warkari, and Haridasa tradition, and ...
), ''Satyabhama Vivah'' (Marriage of
Satyabhama Satyabhama (IAST'': Satyabhāmā)'' , also known as Satrajiti, is a Hindu goddess and the third queen consort of the Hindu god Krishna. Satyabhama is described as an incarnation of Bhumi, an aspect of Lakshmi. She is the goddess and the per ...
), ''Ajamilakhyana'' (Story of Ajamila), ''Okhaharan'' (abduction of
Aniruddha Aniruddha () is a character in Hindu mythology, the son of Pradyumna and Rukmavati, and the grandson of Krishna and Rukmini. He is said to have been very much like his grandfather, to the extent that he is considered by some to be a ''Jana ...
by Chitralekha). Dave divides Dayārām's works into seven categories: philosophical works, name of Kr̥ṣṇa/didactic works, narrative works, translations, lyrics, prose works, and miscellaneous works, although he is most renowned for his lyrical poems.


Non-lyrical Works

Dayārām's non-lyrical works strongly promot the Puṣṭimārga, but are of little literary value and are not well-known. A large portion or perhaps the majority of these works remain unpublished. His philosophical texts followed the sectarian Śuddhādvaita doctrine of the Puṣṭimārga, with his most famous being the ''Rasikavallabha'' (1838). He authored a few works concerned with the devotional recitation of the names of Kr̥ṣṇa,
Vallabha Vallabha, also known as Vallabhācārya or Vallabha Dīkṣita (May 7, 1478 – July 7, 1530 CE), was the founder of the Krishna, Kr̥ṣṇa-centered Pushtimarg, Puṣṭimārga sect of Vaishnavism, and propounded the philosophy of Shuddhadvait ...
, Viṭṭhalanātha, hagiographies of Vaiṣṇava devotees, and didactic dramatic dialogue between devotees. Dayārām's narrative poems based on Puranic and Vaiṣṇava hagiographic lore are considered of inferior literary quality. Dayārām is also generally considered to have composed Gujarati translations of the Sanskrit ''Bhagavad Gīta'' and Braj Bhasha works of Sūrdās.


Language

Dayārām wrote in a language similar to modern standard Gujarati with some grammatical variations. These variations have been described as archaisms, dialectal features, or borrowings from
Braj Bhasha Braj is a language within the Indo-Aryan language family spoken in the Braj region in Western Uttar Pradesh centered on Mathura. Along with Awadhi, it was one of the two predominant literary languages of North-Central India before gradually ...
. His vocabulary is a mix of words, with ''
tatsama Tatsama ( , lit. 'same as that') are Sanskrit loanwords in modern Indo-Aryan languages like Assamese, Bengali, Marathi, Nepali, Odia, Hindi, Gujarati, and Sinhala and in Dravidian languages like Tamil, Kannada and Telugu. They generally ...
'' forms dominating, however Dayārām still uses Perso-Arabic loanwords which were later eliminated from literary language in the nineteenth century.


See also

*
List of Gujarati-language writers The following is an alphabetical list of Gujarati writers who has contributed in Gujarati literature; presenting an overview of notable authors, journalists, novelists, playwrights, poets and screenwriters who have released literary works in the Gu ...


References


Further reading

*
''The Gujarati Lyrics of Kavi Dayarambhai''
by
Rachel Dwyer Rachel Dwyer is a professor of Indian Cultures and Indian cinema, Cinema at SOAS, University of London. Life Dwyer took her BA in Sanskrit at SOAS, followed by an MPhil in General Linguistics and Comparative Philology at the University of Oxford. ...


External links

* * *
Sangeet Bhuvan Trust
{{Authority control Gujarati-language writers Gujarati-language poets 1853 deaths 1777 births Cultural history of Gujarat Bhakti movement