due to the domination of the influence of the old world pandit who refuses recognition to polite speech3. A vague idea seems to prevail that the grammar of the literary dialect has universal application to all dialects, whose usages are considered right or wrong according, as they conform or not, to its rules. This process is something like judging the correctness of Italian by the grammar of Latin, or of the Prakrits by Sanskrit grammar. I am afraid these new grammatical distinctions of traditional grammar, accepted grammar, and existing grammar are not used with any clearness of conception and are meant by their very vagueness, to create an impression that the grammar, which they connote, is fortified by ancient authority and modern acceptance. If by traditional grammar the Old school mean grammatical treatises of orthodox writers old and new, it would be only another instance of the irresponsible manner in which they set up as standard what is unscientific and unsound. Speaking of the Canarese grammar Sabdamanidarpana, Dr. Burnell made a reference to the short-comings of the Telugu grammarians. “The great and real merit of Sabdamanidarpana is that it bases the rules on independent research and the usage of writers of repute; in this way it is far ahead of the Telugu and Tamil treatises, which are much occupied with vain scholastic disputation.” The contrast between the method of Telugu grammarians and Canarese grammarians is put pointedly in Mr. Rice’s remarks on Bhattakalanka’s Canarese Sabdanusasana. “It is not an antique treatise dealing with archaisms and obsolete terms interesting as a literary monument though of little practical value, but has the advantage of treating the whole range of the language down to the modern period and its rules are such as apply to the present time.” (Vide page 4, Rice’s edition of Bhattakalanka’s Sabdanusasanam). In the preface to his Telugu philology, the late Professor Seshagiri Sastri made scathing condemnation of orthodox Telugu grammars.
