Sahitya Akademi Awards announced, regional authors shine

NEW DELHI: Authors Mamang Dai, Ramesh Kuntal along with 22 other regional authors have been named for the Sahitya Akademi Awards for this year.

The Sahitya Akademi on Thursday announced its annual awards in 24 languages.

Seven novels, five collections each of poetry and short stories, five works of literary criticism, a play and a book of essays are among those cited.

While Dai won the award for her English novel The Black Hill, Ramesh Kuntal got it for his literary criticism Vishw Mithak Sarit Sagar in Hindi.

Authors Jayanta Madhab Bora (Assamese), Afsar Ahmed (Bengali), Rita Boro (Bodo), Nachhattar (Punjabi), Niranjan Mishra (Sanskrit) won the award for their novels, while Shiv Mehta (Dogri), Autar Krishen Rahbar (Kashmiri), Gajanan Jog (Konkani), Gayatri Saraf (Odia) and Baig Ehsas (Urdu) bagged it in the short stories category.

In the poetry category, Udaya Narayana Singh (Maithili), Bhujanga Tudu (Santhali), Inquilab (posthumous) (Tamil), Devipriya (Telegu), Shrikant Deshmukh (Marathi) won the award.

Apart from Kuntal, the other writers who won the award for literary criticism are Urmi Ghanshyam Desai (Gujarati), TP Ashoka (Kannada), Bina Hangkhim (Nepali) and Neeraj Daiya (Rajasthani).

Rajen Toijamba (Manipuri) and Jagdish Lachhani (Sindhi) won the award for their play and essay respectively.

“The books were selected on the basis of recommendations made by a jury of three members in the concerned languages in accordance with the procedure laid down for the purpose,” K Sreenivasarao, Secretary, Sahitya Akademi, said.

The award in the form of a cheque of Rs 1 lakh, a shawl and a casket containing an engraved copper-plaque, will be presented at a special function to be held on February 12, 2018.

The family of late poet Inqulab (born as Shahul Hameed) has decided not to accept the award announced for him, the poet’s son said on Thursday.