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After the last part of the Kavyamala Gucchakas in 1906, no
sustained attention was bestowed on this line of work. This was
also the time when new collections of Sanskrit manuscripts were
being organised in Universities and Oriental Institutes, all of
which threw up an enormous amount of minor poems, playlets,
hymns, centuries of lyrics and reflective verses, short texts on
poetics, prosody etc. Histories of Sanskrit literature which were
written could not know all this continuous output in Sanskrit
through the centuries and most of them confined their accounts
to the period before the 12th or 13th century, with brief mention
of stray or select works of the later centuries.
 
I had been advocating for long that Sanskrit manuscript
libraries, in addition to their series of major Text-editions, should
run their own Bulletins and publish therein the minor works in
their collections. The Trivandrum (now Kerala) University
Manuscripts Library, with which I had some association, adopted
the suggestion and upto this day, the journal of this Library, the
only one to keep to this plan so far, has been able to bring to
light a considerable number of poems, plays, hymns etc. written
by authors who flourished in Kerala or were patronised by the
different royal houses in Kerala.
 
The Sanskrit Commission appointed by the Government of
India devoted much attention to the question of manuscripts and
their publication. The Central Sanskrit Institute (Kendriya Sams-
krita Vidyapitha), Tirupati, which is born out of the Commission's
Repo:t, has naturally the responsibility to carry out as many as
possible of the Commission's recommendations coming within the
purview of its work. This need to bring to light the large mass
of short works lying in manuscripts was mentioned in the outline
of work I presented at the first Convocation of the Vidyapeetha,
which was addressed by the then Union Education Minister,
Dr. K. Shrimali, and later my proposal to the Research Committee
of the Institute to edit and bring out for the Institute, for this
purpose, a periodical called Malayamāruta was endorsed by the
members.
 
The plan of the Malayamãruta is the same as that of the
Kavyamālā Gucchakas. Short unpublished works, in the same
fields covered by the latter, will be issued here. When more than