Sahitya Akademi announces winners for Bal Sahitya

Sahitya Akademi, India's national academy of letters, on Friday announced a list of 23 winners for the Bal Sahitya Puraskar and 21 recipients for the Yuva Puraskar for this year.

While the Bal Puraskar will be conferred upon the winners on November 14, Children's Day, the day for Yuva Puraskar is yet to be decided.

"The list of awardees was recommended by a jury of members representing 22 Indian languages and was approved by the Executive Board of the Sahitya Akademi, which met today (Friday) under the chairmanship of Chandrashekhar Kambar, president, Sahitya Akademi," K Sreenivasarao, Secretary, Sahitya Akademi, said.

Ten collections of poetry including works by Aasteek Vajpeyi (Hindi), Samragnee Bandopadhyay (Bengali), Esha Dadawala (Gujarati), Tongbram Amarjit Singh (Manipuri), Dushyant Joshi (Rajasthani), and Muni Rajsundar Vijay (Sanskrit) have won the Yuva Puraskar.

Three collections of short stories, two novels and one play have also been selected for the award.

While the jury for the Yuva Puraskar found "no suitable book" for English, the winner for Bodo language will be declared on a later date.

The winners of both the awards will receive a casket containing an engraved copper plaque and a cheque of Rs 50,000.