Sahitya Akademi Award - Current Affairs Questions and Answers

ANSWER: K. Katyayani

Explanation:
The writer will be returning her award in solidarity with other writers against state supported violence. She received the Sahitya Akademi award in 2013 for her work`Saahityakasham Lo Sagam', a critique of literature.

ANSWER: Munawwar Rana

Explanation:
Celebrated Hindi and Urdu poet Munawwar Rana has decided to return the Sahitya Akademi award. He has also refused to accept any awards from the government after this. Rana had won the Sahitya Akademi award in 2014 for massive contribution to Urdu literature and poetry. Before him, writers such as Katyayani Vidmahe and Ghulab Nabi Khayal as well as Nand Bhardwaj have returned their awards.

ANSWER: Nand Bhardwaj

Explanation:
Well known Rajasthani and Hindi writer as well as former Director, DD, Nand Bhardwaj has joined other Sahitya Akademi winners in the protest against religious intolerance in the nation. Bhardwaj returned the award he had received in 2004 for the novel Samhi Khulto Marag. He expressed solidarity with late rationalist M. M. Kalburgi. He is also the Rajasthan coordinator for Jaipur Literature Festivals since it was conceived. This takes the number of authors who have returned their Akademi award to 29 and around 5 writers have also resigned from official positions in the literary body.

ANSWER: Mandakranta Sen

Explanation:
Well known Bengali poet Mandakratna Sen has returned the Sahitya Akademi award which she had received in 2004, on 13th October 2015. She received the Young Writers Special Award at 30 years of age for her work on Bengali poetry.

ANSWER: Mangalesh Dabral

Explanation:
Well known writer, critic, editor and Hindi poet Mangalesh Dabral has returned his Sahitya Akademi award becoming one of the many since Uday Prakash started this form of protest over the killing of MM Kalburgi. Fellow Hindi poet Rajesh Joshi also returned the Sahitya Akademi award. Also among the 7 writers who returned the award were 5 noted Punjabi writers- Ajmer Singh Aulakh, Atamjit, Gurbachan Bhullar and Waryam Sandhu and Shiromani Lekhak award winner Megh Raj Mitter.

ANSWER: Ghulam Nabi Khayal

Explanation:
Eminent Kashmiri writer and poet Ghulam Nabi Khayal has returned the Sahitya Akademi award which he had won for his book “Gashik Minaar” in 1975 in protest against the threat being faced by minorities in the nation. This is one of the latest authors to protest against the rising communalism and intolerance in Indian society following the Dadri lynching. This marks the first time a Kashmiri writer has made the decision to return the literary honour for protesting against the communal atmosphere in numerous parts of the country.

ANSWER: All of the above

Explanation:
Following the returning of the Sahitya Akademi award by authoress Nayantara Sehgal, poet Ashok Vajpayi has returned the literary honour for PM Narendra Modi’s silence regarding recent killings of M. M. Kalburgi, Govind Pansare and Mohammed Akhlaq. Earlier, Hindi writer and noted literary figure Uday Prakash had also returned the award for the same reason.

ANSWER: Nayantara Sehgal

Explanation:
Well known author and niece of Jawaharlal Nehru, Nayantara Sehgal has on 6th October 2015 returned the Sahitya Akademi award to protest growing intolerance against right to dissent in the nation. Sehgal received the award in the 1980s for English novel Rich Like Us (1985). She also cited the recent murders of rationalists like M. M. Kalburgi and Govind Pansare apart from the brutal lynching of village blacksmith Mohammed Akhlaq on the charge of cooking beef in his home.