Ramdarash Mishra selected for Saraswati Samman 2021

Instituted in 1991, Saraswati Samman is one of the most prestigious literary awards in the country. It carries a citation, a plaque, and a cash prize of ₹15 lakh

Noted poet and litterateur Prof Ramdarash Mishra will be awarded the prestigious Saraswati Samman, 2021, for his collection of poems ‘Mein to Yahan Hun’, the KK Birla Foundation announced in a statement on Monday.

Ramdarash Mishra selected for Saraswati Samman 2021

Instituted in 1991, Saraswati Samman is one of the most prestigious literary awards in the country. It is given every year to an outstanding literary work written in any Indian language by an Indian citizen and published within the last 10 years. It carries a citation, a plaque, and a cash prize of ₹15 lakhs. The recipient is chosen by a selection committee, whose current head is Dr Subhash C Kashyap, former secretary-general of the Lok Sabha Secretariat.

Born in Dumri village in Uttar Pradesh’s Gorakhpur district on August 15, 1924, Mishra has excelled in different branches of Hindi literature. In a career spanning decades, the 98-year-old has to his credit 32 collections of poems, 15 novels, 30 short-story collections, 15 books of literary criticism, four collections of essays, travelogues, and several memoirs. He has also served as an important member of different Hindi consultative committees in various ministries and retired as a professor from the Hindi department of the University of Delhi.

In ‘Mein to Yahan Hun’, the literary stalwart brings to the fore different aspects of inner life, societal concerns, communalism, corruption, human perspectives, exploitation of the Dalits, disquieting urban cities, exuberance of the seasons and climatic concerns. In the collection, which was published in 2015, he writes: “I have written in many genres. Whatever form of text I got fascinated with I kept my journey on. At times the journey was short and sometimes lengthy too. But now I am not left with much energy to traverse long tracks. So my expressions now are either a short poem or writing a diary, eventually shaping this book.”