BATA – Meet & Greet session with Sri. SiriVennela SitaRama Sastry garu enthralled audience.

Bay Area Telugu Association “BATA” organized a meet & greet session with Notable Telugu Lyricist

Sri Sirivennela SitaRama sastry garu on July 8th at Swagat Indian Cuisine, Milpitas, CA.

The program started with a unique medley of Sirivennela songs. Murali Chari , Krishna kanth, Sudha Sastry & Sundari rendered some of the most wonderful songs penned by Sirivennela in his honor.

Vijaya Aasuri served as master of ceremony for the evening. Vijaya welcomed sirivennela garu on to the dias. She said it is Bay Area telugu community’s good fortunate to host Sirivennela and said he is one of her all time favorite lyricists.

Sirivennala started his speech by saying, “There is nothing left for me to say! The BATA folks have captured the essence of my poetry in their introduction.” He then launched into one of his favorite topics: “How art is enmeshed with our day-to-day life, and how it cannot be just appreciated in isolation.” According to him, the abstractness in literature needs a medium to manifest itself. Earlier that medium used to be the “Naataka rangam”, now it’s the movies. He asserted that “kaavyEshu naaTakam ramyam: The beauty of poetry needs to be enacted to make total sense.”

He observed that while movie making was more art than business in the good old days of Telugu cinema, it has now tranformed into more of a business with a semblance of art. However he stressed that business, in itself, is not bad as long as it is mutually beneficial to all the parties involved. He felt that one doesn’t need an occasion to celebrate life. “pamDaga anEdi phaalaana rOjE kaanakkarlEdu. manamu anukunte prati rOjoo pamDagE!” On a similar vein, he lamented that while we know where our distant relatives lived, we are shut off from our immediate neighborsin today’s apartment culture. He concluded his speech by saying the epigram “vasudhaika kuTumbam” should not just be paid lip service to,but observed in its true spirit.

His speech lasted for more than 1 hour, and the audience were pleasantly surprised to see his level of expertise on various topics and were glued to the seats. He said he always strives to strike balance between humanity and proud feeling of being Indian in all his songs. “Mathru Devo Bava” is a concept which is very close to his heart and should be propogated through out the whole world. He also stressed the importance of unity & integrity.

The audience were eager to hear more even though it was a weekend and it was way past 11:00 pm.

BATA President Prasad Mangina, thanked Sirivennela for making the program not only entertaining but very informative also. He also said “Telugu Varu” should feel proud to have a versatile personality like Sirivennela. BATA executive committee consisting of Prasad Mangina, Srilu Veligeti, Srinivas Kolli, Ramesh Konda , Srinivas Mangipudi, Vijaya Aasuri, Sireesha Battula, Kamesh Malla, Venkat Malladi, Veeru Vuppala, Karun Veligeti, Ravi Thiruveedula & Yugandhar Karakala felicitated Sirivennela.

BATA committee also thanked TANA President Sri. JayaRam Komati garu for hosting this event at Swagat Indian Cusisine (Milpitas).