5 Punjabi writers among 12 offer to return awards

New Delhi/Chandigarh, October 12

Twelve authors, including five from Punjab, today decided to return their Sahitya Akademi awards over spread of “communal poison” and “rising intolerance” in the country.

In a joint statement, Punjabi writer and poet Surjit Patar, novelist and story writer Baldev Singh Sadaknama, poets Jaswinder and Darshan Buttar said they would return their awards as a mark of protest.

Citing the murder of noted rationalists and the Dadri lynching incident, the writers said the current attempts to create “communal divisions” and “religious fundamentalism” in the society were unacceptable and should be fought against jointly.

They said returning the award was a form of protest, but they were ready for other forms of dissent as well.

Punjabi author Waryam Sandhu, Kashmiri writer Ghulam Nabi Khayal, Urdu novelist Rahman Abbas, Kannada writer Srinath DN, Kannada translator GN Ranganatha Rao, Hindi writers Mangalesh Dabral and  Rajesh Joshi, and theatre artist Maya Krishna Rao, too, decided to return their awards. — PTI