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A Humanist Publisher
He is popularly called CK and his full name is CK Narayana Reddy. Vallampati Venkatasubbaiah is the noted critic of Telugu literature that my father always commended for his commitment to Communist ideology. I was only a boy of 5 years when CK was the MLA of our constituency, Piler, and by the time I was in Junior college, he had settled down in Hyderabad and I never had the opportunity to meet hi
Realising the importance of intellectual revolution, former politician and founder of Hyderabad Book Trust, CK Narayana Reddy published good books at affordable price to spread great human values
He is popularly called CK and his full name is CK Narayana Reddy. Vallampati Venkatasubbaiah is the noted critic of Telugu literature that my father always commended for his commitment to Communist ideology. I was only a boy of 5 years when CK was the MLA of our constituency, Piler, and by the time I was in Junior college, he had settled down in Hyderabad and I never had the opportunity to meet him.
However, I have been reading the books he published right from 1973 and learnt many things about him through my friends, but was only too eager to learn more about CK as many revered him as our local hero. A recent book published by Hyderabad Book Trust, “Nenu Communistuni”, a biography of CK fulfilled my desire to know more about him to a certain extent.
Born in a feudal family of farmers that owned more than 100 acres in a small village near Piler, Chittoor district, CK had his schooling in Tirupati and Madanapalli. He despised discrimination of any kind and believed one should not have personal property and so he signed the documents forfeiting his share and was against procuring any kind of property till the end. When he was an MLA, government allotted land in a posh locality in Hyderabad to all the MLAS, but he refused to accept it.
CK was attracted to the politics from his school days, joined the Socialist Congress Party, played an active role in Quit India movement and wore khadi under the influence of Gandhi. While studying in Madanapalli, he started a ‘Home’ for the students of all castes and creeds. He left college midway, took interest in strengthening the Socialist party and acted as its district secretary for one term.
He participated in the movement that demanded a separate state to the Telugu people in 1952 and supported Telangana movement in later years. Dissatisfied with the developments in the socialist party, he left it and joined communist party in 1953 and remained a true communist till the end. He contested the assembly in 1955 and also in 1962, lost during the first time, but won the second time.
Irrespective of victory or defeat, he worked for the uplift of the poor and downtrodden throughout. He married Jayaprada, a teacher in 1956 and it was an inter-caste marriage. He donated his salary to the war fund of India during the Indo-China war. He used to pay the debt of the farmers to the co-operative societies. Gradually he grew unhappy with the ways of the then communist party too.
He realised that the issues for which they fought for were more beneficial to a few upper castes of coastal region. He believed that they supported the construction of Nagarjuna Sagar dam and overlooked Krishna-Penna project that would have been useful to the backward Rayalaseema region.
There was division amongst the communists during the Indo-China war as a group of them complained that another group that favoured Russia joined hands with the congress party and made them prisoners by treachery. CK was one among the prisoners and that same group became CPI (M) afterwards. He joined CPI (M) party under the leadership of Charu Majundar , went to underground for some time, and was then imprisoned for about two years.
He finally realised the importance of intellectual revolution and so took up the publication of good books at affordable price to spread great human values. Sahavasi’s Telugu translation of Ted Allen and Sidney Gorden’s ‘The Scalpel and The Sword’, ‘Rakthasruvulu’ was the first among them.
He encouraged writers like M V Ramanareddy to translate classics and published a number of Telugu translations of books like, William Hinton’s ‘Shanpen’, Mary Tailor’s ‘My Years in an Indian Prison’, Edgar Snow’s ‘Red Star over China’, Jack London’s ‘Iron Heel’ and Rahul Sankrutyayan’s ‘Olga Se Ganga’. With the help of some friends and relatives, he established Hyderabad Book Trust in 1980.
Gita Ramaswamy, the present director of HBT and the wife of CK’s nephew says that CK was not a rigid man and he never hesitated to change his opinions when he was convinced that he went wrong. He was one of the first, who recognised the importance of Feminist and Dalit movements and encouraged them with publication of books related to them. He led a fulfilled life for 88 years and left the world silently like a passing cloud.
