The Sahitya Akademi has taken effective initiative for documenting the works in tribal languages and literature across the country.
There is abundant presence of tribal oral literature in all the States, in particular in Tamil Nadu, Odisha, and Karnataka. The Sahitya Akademi created awareness about the same by organising seminars and workshops in different parts and this led to the collection of a huge amount of oral literature. The literature collected, so far, has already been brought into a book, noted Tamil scholar, writer and poet Sirpi Balasubramaniam, coordinator of Tamil Advisory Board of Sahitya Akademi, told The Hindu on Friday. “In Tamil Nadu, the songs rendered by the tribal Toda community have been brought into book. This will go a long way in protecting these folk songs and popularising them among the present generation”, he said.
Following representation from various sections of the society, the Akademi is concentrating on promoting literary activities in North-East States such as Mizoram, Arunachal Pradesh etc. More effective programmes have been planned in those States to involve the local writers’ community in the literary activities across the country and bring them into the mainstream. The initiative of the Akademi has evoked overwhelming response not only from the literary society, but also from all sections of the society, he said.
Dr. Balasubramaniam, himself a two-time Sahitya Akademi awardee, said that the country accounted for many languages without script. The Akademi is concentrating in creating script for these languages to protect them from getting vanished and also to bring out the rich literature available in them. “Already the Akademi has identified about a dozen languages without script and the work will commence soon”, he said.
So far, the Akademi was giving awards to the prominent writers in 22 different languages in recognition of their outstanding works in their respective languages. This programme has been extended and the authors of other developing languages, too, will be honoured.
Replying to a question, Dr. Balasubramaniam said that the Akademi has launched a three-pronged programme for promoting literary activities. It included holding workshops, symposiums etc across the country, particularly in the educational institutions, to encourage people to concentrate more on bringing out books in their respective languages.
The publication division of the Akademi has launched an innovative programme titled “Makers of Indian Literature”. Under this, the outstanding literary works of the authors in different languages who had passed away were being introduced to the common people. It also compiles the details and outcome of literary seminars and workshops and published them as books. The events of prestigious institutions are also published.
Dr. Balasubramaniam said that he has suggested to the Akademi to honour outstanding writers with “Sahitya Ratna Award” on the lines of “Bharat Rathna” award. Apart from this, the Akademi at present was honouring the noted senior Indian writers with ‘fellowship’. It has proposed to extend this fellowship scheme to foreign scholars also. On future projects, he said it has a plan of taking the works of Indian authors to international community.