Palanganda Bopanna-Author

Palanganda Bopanna was born on 30^th June 1950.  He is an author and journalist from Kodagu. Bopanna has worked for some of the leading Indian English dailies, including The Times of India, Bangalore.

Family

Father

Palanganda M. Thimmaiah

Mother

Palanganda Kamy Thimmaiah

Wife

Sita Bopanna

Education

He obtained his B.A. degree (Economics) from Madras University (Chennai) and M.A. in Political Science from Karnataka University, Dharwad. He also has a post-graduate diploma in journalism.

Achievements

• Bopanna began his journalistic career in 1981 as the Coorg Correspondent of The Hindu newspaper.
• He worked for 12 years with The Times of India, Bangalore starting as Reporter and exiting as Principal Correspondent.
• He worked for 13 years as Special Correspondent with The Pioneer at Bangalore from August, 1996.
• For six years he served as Bangalore Stringer of the Associated Press, an American news agency. He covered general news with emphasis on human interest stories.
• He taught journalism for six years to undergraduate and post-graduate students from 2001 to 2006.
• For two years, he taught at Surana College, Bangalore, two years at Jain College, Bangalore, and two years at Sri Sri Institute of Media Studies, Bangalore.
•  Presently he is the person who decides the ‘Coorg person of the year’.
• Bopanna launched www.coorgtourisminfo.com, a news and tourism portal in 2005.
• In 2014 he launched a news portal which covers news exclusively from Kodagu, called Coorg news.
• In April 2015, Bopanna released a 35-minute DVD on Coorg called Discover Coorg Video. It featured the tourist spots, homestays, jewellery, and golf ranges in Coorg, the Kodava family hockey festival and Kodava culture, including the traditional folk dances and weddings. It was supported by the Pemanda Monappa Foundation.
• Through his news portal www.coorgtourisminfo.com, P.T. Bopanna started an online campaign to improve the condition of the neglected Hunsur – Gonikoppal Road, a 45-km highway between the districts of Mysuru and Kodagu. But work came to a standstill because the contractors were not paid. In November 2012, Bopanna met Governor Hansraj Bhardwaj and submitted a memorandum for resuming the work. Upon the governor’s direction, the work recommenced but it came to a standstill once again, because of the monsoon rains and because construction materials were not available. Finally, two stretches of the road were completed in late 2014.

Awards

• He won two awards in 1986 instituted by the Bangalore Reporters’ Guild for best crime story and scoop of the year.
• In December 2015 P T Bopanna’s book 2011 The Romance of Indian Coffee was selected for the International Gourmand World Cookbook Awards given under the category of ‘Best Coffee Books’ from India. The Gourmand World Cookbook Awards were founded in 1995 by Edouard Cointreau. Later, at the Gourmand World Awards ceremony held at Yantai in China, ‘The Romance of Indian Coffee’ was chosen as the best book on coffee in the world.

Books

Bopanna has written five books:

• Discover Coorg (2006, Prism Books),The book Discover Coorg, published by Prism Books Ltd., Bangalore, was translated into the Kannada language – Kodagu: Mungaru Maleya Vismayada (2008).
• The Rise and fall of the Coorg State (2009),Another book Rise and fall of the Coorg State has been translated into both the Kannada and the Kodava languages.
• Dateline Coorg (2010).
• Coorg: Land of Beauty and Valour (2010, Prism Books).
• The Romance of Indian Coffee (2011, Prism Books).