Ranjitram Mehta

Ranjitram Mehta
Portrait of Ranjitram Mehta
Portrait of Ranjitram Mehta
Born(1881-10-25)25 October 1881
Surat, Bombay Presidency, British India
(present-day Gujarat, India)
Died4 June 1917(1917-06-04) (aged 35)
Bombay, British India
OccupationResearcher, writer
LanguageGujarati
NationalityIndian
EducationBachelor of Arts
Alma materGujarat College
Notable worksRanjitram Gadyasanchay 1-2 (1982)
ChildrenAsoka Mehta

Ranjitram Vavabhai Mehta (25 October 1881 – 4 June 1917) was a Gujarati language writer from British India.

Biography

Mehta was born on 25 October 1881 in Surat to Vavabhai. He completed his schooling in Ahmedabad where his father was the Chief Engineer of the Ahmedabad Municipal Committee.[1] He completed Bachelor of Arts from Gujarat College in 1903 and served as a fellow for eight months. From 1906 to 1917, he served as a personal assistant of Prof. Gajjar and Prabhashankar Pattani, Dewan of Bhavnagar State. He had served as principal of high school at Umreth in 1905.[2][3]

He founded Gujarat Sahitya Sabha in 1904 and Gujarati Sahitya Parishad in 1905.[4][5] He died on 4 June 1917 by drowning in sea at Juhu beach. The highest award of Gujarati literature and culture, Ranjitram Suvarna Chandrak, is named after him.[3][6]

His son Asoka Mehta (1911-1984) was an Indian independence activist and socialist politician.[1][7][8]

Works

Mehta worked in different genres of literature such as essay, novel, drama and short story. Ranjitkruti Sangrah, a collection of his writings, was published posthumously in 1921 by K. M. Munshi. Ranjitramna Nibandho, a collection of his essays, was also published posthumously in 1923. Gujarat Sahitya Parishad published his complete work as Ranjitram Gadyasanchay 1-2 in 1982 on his birth centenary. Gujarati Sahitya Akademi has published Ranjitram Vavavbhai ane Temnu Sahitya.[6] His Ahmad Rupande (1908) was a love story between Hindu girl and Muslim boy.[9] In 1905, he had coined the Gujarati words Lokgeet and Lokkatha for folklore in a paper presented at Gujarati Sahitya Parishad.[10]

See also

References

  1. ^ a b Verinder Grover (1994). Asoka Mehta. Deep & Deep Publications. pp. 11–. ISBN 978-81-7100-567-3.
  2. ^ Topiwala, Chandrakant, ed. (1999). "Ranjitram Mehta". Gujarati Sahitya Kosh (Encyclopedia of Gujarati Literature) (in Gujarati). Ahmedabad: Gujarati Sahitya Parishad. p. 463.
  3. ^ a b "રણજિતરામ વા. મહેતા" [Ranjitram V Mehta]. Gujarati Sahitya Parishad (in Gujarati). Retrieved 20 June 2017.
  4. ^ Desai, Padma (1 November 2014). From England with Love: An Indian Student Writes from Cambridge (1926–27). Penguin UK. p. 115. ISBN 9789351189022.
  5. ^ Chandra, Sudhir (13 August 2014). The Oppressive Present: Literature and Social Consciousness in Colonial India. Routledge. p. 220. ISBN 9781317559931.
  6. ^ a b Parekh, Madhusudan. "Mehta Ranjitram Vavabhai". In Thakar, Dhirubhai (ed.). Gujarati Vishwakosh. Vol. 15. Gujarati Vishwakosh Trust. pp. 524–525.
  7. ^ Himmat. Vol. 2 Part 2. May 1976. p. 496.
  8. ^ Mainstream. N. Chakravartty. 1994. p. 36.
  9. ^ Das, Sisir Kumar (2000). History of Indian Literature. Sahitya Akademi. p. 309. ISBN 9788172010065.
  10. ^ Chattopadhyaya, D. P.; Ray, Bharati. Different Types of History: Project of History of Science, Philosophy and Culture in Indian Civilization, Volume XIV Part 4. Pearson Education India. p. 538. ISBN 9788131786666.