Punjabi Poet Mohanjit To Get Sahitya Akademi Award For ‘Kone Da Suraj’

Renowned Punjabi poet Mohanjit has been selected for this year’s Sahitya Akademi Award for his book of poems ‘Kone Da Suraj’, The Tribune has reported.

Mohanjit, who hails from Adliwala village in Amristsar, is based in Delhi and a former teacher at Delhi University’s Deshbandhu college.

As per the report, the announcement of award to Mohanjit came as a surprise to his readers because many poets who were inspired by him had gotten the award long back.

“I know it’s too late to get this award at the age of 80, but I didn’t lose my dignity to get it.” Mohanjit told the paper.

Mohanjit’s first poem was published in 1956 and during the 1971 Indo-Pak war, while he was living in Amritsar, he started sending write-ups to Amrita Pritam for Nagmani which were published under ‘Dispatches From The Western Front’.

Earlier, on Wednesday (5 November) Sahitya Akademi announced its annual prestigious awards in 24 languages of India. The award will be given to the recipients on a special function starting from 29 January in the national capital.

Sahitya Akademi award, established in 1954, is conferred upon writers of the most outstanding books of literary merit published in any of the major 24 Indian languages ( including Rajasthani and English apart from the 22 scheduled languages).