He has authored in excess of 100 books, translations and has edited collections of essays, biographical sketches and felicitation volumes.

It records in detail their history with over 50 family trees and assumes importance in the field of caste studies.

The family belonged to the Smartha (Advaita) sect who are followers of Adi Shankaracharya and of the Sringeri Sharada Peetham.

He finished his Intermediate course in 1947–48 and from 1948 until 1954, he pursued undergraduate and post-graduate degrees at University of Mysore, where he enrolled initially in Yuvaraja College and came under the influence of Kannada professors N. Anantarangachar and U. K. Subbarayachar.

[2] Among his teaching faculty were renowned scholars like K. V. Puttappa (Kuvempu) who taught "Pampa Bharata" and "Literary Criticism", D. L. Narasimhachar (History of Literature), S. Srikanta Sastri (Cultural History of Karnataka)(see group photograph), K. V. Raghavachar (Kannada classic – "Basavarajadevara Ragale"), N. Anantarangachar (Kannada Grammar – "Shabdamanidarpana"), T. S. Shamarao (Vachanas of Basavanna) and Parameshwar Bhatt (Bharatesha Vaibhava).

He completed his Master of Arts (Kannada) degree from Maharaja College, Mysore in 1953–54 under the guidance of D. L. Narasimhachar.

Subsequently, he was appointed as lecturer at Osmania University in Hyderabad, Andhra Pradesh in 1959 where he worked hard to lend shape to the nascent Kannada department.

Sastry took up the project, returning a 60-page document that caught the attention of Kannada Adhyayana Samsthe director and his former teacher D. Javaregowda, who with H. M. Nayak persuaded him to relocate to University of Mysore in 1968 to occupy the post of lecturer.

[1] Under the guidance of his former teacher and mentor D. L. Narasimhachar and H. M. Nayak, Sastry pursued his doctoral work on A Comparative Study of Kannada Neminathapuranas and earned his PhD by 1972.

[7][8] He was the first to offer an elaborate discussion on Devachandra's Rajavalikathe and Kempunarayana's Mudra Manjusha, and his PhD attracted considerable attention in literary circles.

[45] Sastry currently resides in Mysore, India with his wife Venkatalakshmi and devotes his time to writing, reviewing, editing and critiquing literary works.