New Delhi/ Jaipur: After months of controversy over alleged “growing intolerance” in the country, Sahitya Akademi on Friday said some of the writers, including Ms Nayantara Sahgal, have agreed to take back the awards they had returned at the outset of the issue.
“Sahitya Akademi has started sending back the awards to the writers. It has already been sent to Nayantara Sahgal. Another writer Nand Bhardwaj has also agreed to take back the award. It would be sent to other writers as well,” Sahitya Akademi president Vishwanath Prasad Tiwari told agencies.
He said the Akademi is also sending a copy of their resolution, which was passed in the October meeting, to all writers mentioning that there was no provision in its constitution to return the honours.
On October 23, Sahitya Akademi passed a unanimous resolution appealing to state and Central governments to take steps to prevent such incidents and asked authors to take back the awards they had returned to protest against “rising intolerance”.
“The Akademi strongly condemns the killing of writer Kalburgi and appeals to the state and Central government to take steps to prevent such incidents in the future,” Krishnaswamy Nachimuthu, an executive committee board member had said after the nearly two-hour meeting.
About 40 writers had returned their awards in the past few months to the Sahitya Akademi in the backdrop of Akademi’s silence on the murder of fellow writer M.M. Kalburgi, as well against the “communal” atmosphere in the country following the Dadri lynching incident.Meanwhile, a culture ministry source said, “There is is a list of 10 writers who have agreed to take back the awards they had returned. Sahgal and Bhardwaj are two confirmed names in the list.”
