Seven More Authors Return Sahitya Akademi Awards

On Monday, eminent Gujarati literary figure Anil Joshi joined the league of writers and poets who are returning their Sahitya Akademi awards as a form of protest against the “rising intolerance” and “communal poisoning” in the country. Sugathakumari said she will protests against the attack on the freedom of expression in other ways.

Public lynching over a slab of meat, cold blooded murders of writers, rationalists and a wave of crimes of intolerance has led well-known Indian writers and winners of the prestigious Sahitya Akademi award, to innovatively script their dissent.

Two Kannada writers, Srinath D.N. and G.N. Ranganatha Rao, have also renounced their Akademi translation prizes.

In protest against condemnable Dadri incident, as the ire of writers against Modi government is still continuing, one more renowned novelist in Malyalam Literature, Sarah Joseph, returned her Sahitya Akademi Award on Saturday.

With this, at least 21 authors and poets have announced their decision to return their awards, with a few warning that the minorities in the country today feel “unsafe and threatened”. The writers also warned that the communal poison is spreading in the country and the threat of dividing people looms large.

Satchidanandan was serving in the General Council, Executive Board and Financial Committee of the Akademi.

The AMK, President, Syed Shujaat Bukhari, said, “The writers who returned their awards in protest against the increasing communalization and criminalization in India must be supported by one and all”.

He said the Akademi would like to remind everyone that not only is it the highest literary institution in India, but is also run by the writers. A week after his killing, I participated in a seminar organized by the Sahitya Akademi.

After the Dadri lynching, the Urdu writing community has been quite unhappy. The first ever Sahitya Akademi Award was given to Makhanlal Chaturvedi in year 1955 for hi ‘Himtarangini.’ In year 1957, this Puraskar was conferred on Acharya Narendra Deo (posthumously) for Buddha Dhamma Shatra, said the sources.

Punjabi theatre personality Atamjit Singh said he was returning his Akademi Award as he “is very upset over the incidents communal hatred in the country for the last a few months”. “They are highly condemnable”, Malagatti said.

The Akademi had given the awards or inducted officials on the basis of talent and merit, and those factors stand undiminished.

Then the venerable Karnataka author Chandrashekhar Patil returned his state awards, plaques, idols and cheques – “everything except the garland”, he said.