The practice of giving the Sahitya Akademi awards at the cost of the public exchequer is dubious. Isn't this an offshoot of the communist system of honouring writers who sings paeans to the rulersIJ This must end
It is the season of protests in India. There is nothing surprising about it as protests have been going on in our country since the BJP-led NDA Government first assumed office in New Delhi. The Communist Party of India (Marxist) was the first to come out and protest against the ‘hidden agenda’, the ‘saffronisation drive’ and, of course, the economic liberalisation policies of the Government of the day. In fact, the agitations and protests began within days of the swearing-in ceremony of the Vajpayee Government.
Remember the hijacking of the Indian Airlines flight IC 814 in 1999, by Islamic terrorists, when it was on its way to New Delhi from KathmanduIJ While the Vajpayee Government was busy devising strategies to resolve the stand-off and save the lives of 180 passengers and 15 crew member, the 24X7 news channels were beaming live pictures of a different kind. Ms Brinda Karat, the CPI(M) leader, was leading a procession of 300 people to the residence of the then Prime Minister, to pressure him to arrange for the early release of the passengers and crew members who had been taken hostage by the terrorists.
This was an unusual scene. On the one hand, was a Government trying hard to save precious lives of the abducted passengers from the ill-fated aircraft, and on the other hand, there were politicians putting pressure on the Government to work fast.
Memories of Ms Karat’s protests came to this writer’s mind, when news channels were beaming ‘breaking news’ about Ms Nayantara Sahgal and Mr Ashok Vajpeyi returning their Sahitya Akademi Awards. Ms Sahgal had won the prestigious literary award in 1986 for her novel Rich like Us. Mr Vajpeyi, a Congress follower, won the award in 1994, for his poetry collection, Kahin Nahin Wahin.
The prize money given by the Akademi to Ms Sahgal was `10,000. Mr Vajpeyi had received `25,000. The difference in the prize money was due to the hike made by the Union Government from time-to-time. During 1983 to 1987, the Sahitya Akademi Award carried a cash prize of `10,000, which was increased to `25,000 in 1988. Now the award is worth `1,00,000.
Sarah Joseph, the Malayalam author, who too has announced her decision to return her Sahitya Akademi award, never had any problem receiving it in 2003 in spite of the controversy associated with the Gujarat violence.
A glance at the list of Sahitya Akademi Award winners will reveal that most of them are writers or literary figures who support the Government of the day. The practice of the Union Government instituting such an award at the cost of the public exchequer is dubious. Isn’t this an offshoot of the communist system of honouring writers who sings paeans to the rulersIJ
The erstwhile Soviet Government had instituted a number of awards, under the ‘Akademi’ label, for the wholesale purchase of loyalty from writers, novelists, poets, painters and art critics. Only those who eulogised the Soviet system of Government — in short the communists — were recognised as literary figures in the USSR.
Alexander Solzhenitsyn, who penned some of the best books like The Gulag Archipelago and Cancer Ward, was honoured with the Nobel Prize in literature. However, he did not figure in the list of writers that was compiled by the Writers Union of the USSR.
Jawaharlal Nehru too followed the same system in the post-independence era. Those who pushed their pens in favour of the Government were honoured with the award and safaris to foreign countries, at the expense of the general public. It is not surprising that pre-independence India had much better novelists, poets and short story writers than the present lot.
Both Ms Sahgal and Mr Vajpeyi returned the award because they were ‘disturbed’ by the assault on the diverse culture of the country. Yet, Ms Sahgal never felt any qualms in receiving the award from a Government which only two years earlier had been accused of butchering more than 3,000 Sikh community members in 1984. Mr Vajpeyi also had no courage to say ‘no’ to the Congress Government of the day, when he was offered the award.
One can understand their sense of frustration and disgust over the killings of the ‘rationalists’, MM Kalburgi, Narendra Dabholkar and Govind Pansare. Equally unfortunate was the lynching of Mohammad Akhlaq, following rumours that he had stored and consumed beef.
Dabholkar was murdered in 2013 and Pansare this year. Both murders happened in Maharashtra. Kalburgi was killed in Karnataka this year. These are all issues coming under the purview of the concerned State Governments. How is the Union Government responsible for these murdersIJ
The only beneficiaries of the returning of prestigious awards are the awardees themselves. look at the free publicity which they have received, following their carefully orchestrated announcements!
This is happening when primetime slots in news channels are sold at the rate of lakhs of rupees per second.