PM shares Badal Najundaswamy's artwork

Najundaswamy had created the artwork over two years ago in associa- tion with the All India Institute of Speech and Hearing in Mysuru

NT Correspondent

Bengaluru: On Monday, when Prime Minister Narendra Modi visited the state to inaugurate the Hindustan Aeronautics Limited (HAL) helicopter manufacturing facility in Tumakuru, he addressed the gathering partially in Kannada.

He then re-tweeted a post that has Kannada alphabets merged with pictorial representations providing a hint of the letter. “A creative way to make learning languages a fun activity… In this case, the beautiful Kannada language,” the tweet reads. The work re-tweeted by the Prime Minister is from Baadal Najundaswamy.

Expressing happiness over his work being shared by the PM, the famed artist took to Twitter and thanked the PM. Najundaswamy had created the artwork over two years ago in association with the All India Institute of Speech and Hearing (AIISH) in Mysuru.

The wall art was aimed to help children with special needs to learn Kannada. Each of the 49 alphabets in the language is represented by sketches of objects or animals whose names start with the said alphabet. It took him close to two weeks to put together the details and finish the project.

Baadal took inspiration from the words he learnt as a child and drew the alphabets with a page as the background in order to make the children feel like they are reading from a “big book”. He is known for creating art that raises a voice against issues of governance –be it potholes, the migrant labour crisis or the importance of wearing a mask in public spaces.

The project is slightly off the regular beat. Nanjundaswamy has said that he made the artwork to help teachers who during the times of the pandemic had to face many challenges, especially when it came to teaching children with special needs.

He also faced a creative challenge while coming up with the artwork as it was meant for educational purposes, meaning he had to make sure the alphabets receive more prominence than the sketches. On the other hand, some netizens have said that the PM is leveraging the tweet to garner Kannadiga votes for the forthcoming Assembly elections.