All the ruckus around an MS Subbulakshmi award being given to TM Krishna, outspoken Carnatic musician, appears to have doubled the sound of applause on Christmas Day when he performed as part of the annual conferences and concerts of the Madras Music Academy. Ever since March 2024, when the Music Academy announced him as the winner of this year's Sangita Kalanidhi award, many angry words, declarations, and even a court case had piled up against Krishna. The anger aggravated to certain musicians taking a "pledge" on stage about "respecting the Bhakti and Dharmic roots of Carnatic music".
The Sangita Kalanidhi, an annual award given by the Academy, has existed since 1942. In 2005, another annual award began to be bestowed upon the winner — a cash prize instituted by The Hindu called Sangita Kalanidhi MS Subbulakshmi award. The court case revolved around the latter, with Subbulakshmi's grandson V Shrinivasan opposing the conferring of an award named after his grandmother to TM Krishna. Shrinivasan accused Krishna of criticising his grandmother on multiple occasions. He also cited her will in which she specifically asked that no memorials or trusts be there for her. Initially, a single judge of the Madras High Court passed an interim order, restraining The Hindu from giving an award named after Subbulakshmi, to honour her last wishes in her will. However, on December 13, a division bench of the Madras High Court set aside this injunction, and two days later Krishna received his award.
Kali Veerapathiran, a noted dancer and teacher of classical and folk artistes, can't get over his shock that all this should befall a man like Krishna, who brought Carnatic music to his village Kovalam – to a fishing community traditionally barred from the genre of music due to casteist notions of ‘purity’.
Kali, a Dalit man, does not wish to talk about the opportunities he has lost on account of his Scheduled Caste status. He has worked extra hard, he stresses, to reach where he has, and Krishna has played a big part in his education. "I did not know it at the time, but he paid for my post graduation. It is not only financial aid that he has given me; he has been an elder brother and a mentor, advising me about the arts," Kali says.
