Poets dominated this year’s Sahitya Akademi award winners with eight books of poetry among 24 categories of literature being chosen for the honours.
The poets honoured with the award are Praduman Singh Jindrahia (Dogri), Kailash Vajpeyi (Hindi), Jess Fernandes (Konkani), Raghu Leishangthem (Manipuri), Vasant Abaji Dahake (Marathi), Phani Mohanty (Oriuya), Damayanti Beshra (Santhali) and Puviarasu (Tamil).
Those who won the awards for their collection of short stories include Vaidehi (Kannada), late Manmohan Jha (Maithili), Samiran Chhetri ‘Priyadarshi’ (Nepali), Major Ratan Jangid (Rajasthani), Prashasya Mitra Shastri (Sanskrit) and Anand Khemani (Sindhi).
Well-known novelists Dhrubajyoti Bora (Assamese), late Manoranjan Lahary (Bodo), U A Khadar (Malayalam) and Yarlagadda Laxmi Prasad (Telugu) were also honoured with the awards for 2009, Secretary, Sahitya Akademi Agrahara Krishna Murthy, told reporters.
Sri Chaturvedi Badrinath (English), Shirish Panchal (Gujarati), Mashal Sultanpuri (Kashmiri) and Abdul Kalam Qasmi (Urdu) won the awards for their books of criticism.
Sourin Bhattacharya (Bengali) for his book of essays and Atamjit (Punjabi) for his book of plays also got the awards.
