Padma Shri Purnamasi Jani

Padma Awards – one of the highest civilian Awards of the country conferred by the President of India. This year the President has approved conferment of 119 Padma Awards including 6 Padma Awards 2021 from Odisha.

1 Renowned sculptor, Sudarshan Sahoo gets Padma Vibhushan & Other 5 people, Dr. Krishna Mohan Pathi, Shri Rajat Kumar Kar, Shri Nanda Kishore Prusty, Ms. Purnamasi Jani & Ms. Shanti Devi Gets Padma Shri Award.  

Here's a writeup on Padma Shri Purnamasi Jani, Recipient of Padma award for excellency in the field of Art.

Purnamasi Jani born in the year 1944 at Dalapada in Khajuripada block of Kandhamal district. She born to the primary teacher Nilakantha Jani & Ranimati of Kandha tribe. 

From an early age, her mother died, leaving her with family responsibilities. She was deprived of education due to this. 

According to Kandha tradition, she was married to Aaradhana Jani of Charipada village at a very young age. She had six children in ten years of marriage, but one after another died shortly after birth. Purnamasi was mentally broken after these incident. After the incident, a man named Sadashiv told her to concentrate on worship of sages and lords. After worship she had two daughters, Tapswini and Yajnaseni.

After this incident, she gradually turned her attention to spirituality. She went to the Tadisaru mountains of Tikabali and meditated there, Returning from there to the village, she became known as Tadisaru Bai. Then she began to create bhajans, devotional songs. She went on to create many Devi arati and Jagannath bhajans. She has sung nearly a million songs since then, but surprisingly none of her bhajans have been repeated. Although she has not been to school, she has sung many devotional bhajans in Odia and Kui.

Dr. Surendra Prasad Mohanty, Dr. Premananda Mohapatra, Dr. Banoj Kumar Ray and many others have compiled a collection of her poems. Her followers are trying to publish many poems in the form of books, through Tadisaru Trust.

Purnamasi Jani, who was previously honored with the Sahitya Akademi Award, Banshidhar Ila Panda Saraswat Sadhana Award and the All India Sahitya Parishad Award, has now honored with Padma Shri for her excellency.


References :

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