Vishukumar, the faceless man behind Karnataka Budget’s creatives

BENGALURU: The budget speech in Kannada that Chief Minister Siddaramaiah read out on Friday was the 21st one Kannada & Cultu re Director N.R.Vishukumar handled. The first budget he translated from English was in 1995 when Siddaramaiah was Finance Minister in the H.D.Deve Gowda cabinet.

The officer, who joined the Information department in 1990 as Senior Assistant Director, became Special Officer to the Finance Minister in 1995. When he found the quality of translation, handled then by a team of translators too technical, he offered to step in and do it himself. On seeing the copy, Siddaramaiah was satisfied and, that is how he came to be associated with the Budget exercise.

For many years he was translating the English speech into Kannada and would add creative inputs including verses from Kannada poets and quotes from well-known writers. In recent years, however, he has been handling aspects like editing and embellishing the language, and deciding on the design keeping in mind the impact the government wants the speech to make on people.