Sahitya Akademi Award

The Sahitya Akademi Award is a literary honour in India, which the Sahitya Akademi, India's National Academy of Letters, annually confers on writers of the most outstanding books of literary merit published in any of the 22 languages of the 8th Schedule to the Indian constitution as well as in English and Rajasthani language.

Established in 1954, the award comprises a plaque and a cash prize of ₹ 100,000. The award's purpose is to recognise and promote excellence in Indian writing and acknowledge new trends. The annual process of selecting awardees runs for the preceding 12 months. The plaque awarded by the Sahitya Akademi was designed by the Indian filmmaker Satyajit Ray. Prior to this, the plaque occasionally was made of marble, but this practice was discontinued because of its excessive weight. During the Indo-Pakistan War of 1965, the plaque was substituted with national savings bonds.

Lists of Sahitya Akademi Award winners cover winners of the Sahitya Akademi Award, a literary honor in India which Sahitya Akademi, India's National Academy of Letters, annually confers on writers of outstanding works in one of the twenty-four major Indian languages. The lists are alphabetically organized by language.

They form the highest honor which the Akademi confers through a system of electing Fellows and Honorary Fellows. (Sahitya Akademi Award is the second-highest literary honor next to a Sahitya Akademi Fellowship).

Sahitya Akademy gives these special awards to writers for significant contribution to Indian languages other than the above 24 major ones and also for contributions to classical and medieval literature. Like the Sahitya Akademi Awards, Bhasha Samman too comprise a plaque and a cash prize of ₹100,000 (from 2009). The Sahitya Akademi instituted the Bhasha Samman in 1996 to be given to writers, scholars, editors, collectors, performers or translators who have made considerable contribution to the propagation, modernization or enrichment of the languages concerned. The Samman carries a plaque along with an amount equal to its awards for creative literature (i.e. ₹100,000. It was ₹25,000) at the time of inception, increased to ₹40,000 from 2001, ₹50,000 from 2003 and to ₹100,000 from 2009. The Sammans are given to 3-4 persons every year in different languages on the basis of recommendations of experts' committees constituted for the purpose.

The first Bhasha Sammans were awarded to Dharikshan Mishra for Bhojpuri, Bansi Ram Sharma and M.R. Thakur for Pahari (Himachali), K. Jathappa Rai and Mandara Keshava Bhat for Tulu and Chandra Kanta Mura Singh for Kokborok, for their contribution to the development of their respective languages. Bhojpuri language has received highest number of Bhasha Samman award.

Awards for translations were instituted in 1989 at the insistence of the then-Prime Minister of India, P. V. Narasimha Rao. The Sahitya Akademi annually gives these awards for outstanding translations of major works in other languages into one of the 24 major Indian languages. The awards comprise a plaque and a cash prize of ₹50,0000. The initial proposal for translation prizes contained provisions for a prize for translations into each of the twenty-two languages recognised by the Akademi; however, this was soon found to be unviable for several reasons: the Akademi found that there were insufficient entries in all the languages, and there were difficulties in locating experts knowledgeable in both, the language of translation and the original language, to judge the translations. Consequently, the Board decided to dispense with its original requirement for additional expert committees to evaluate the translations and also ruled that it was not obligated to grant prizes in languages where suitable books were not nominated. The Akademi also requires that both, the original author as well as the translator, are to be Indian nationals.

Over time, the Akademi has modified and expanded the conditions for the Translation Prizes. In 1982, the Akademi began to allow translations made in link languages to be eligible for the Awards, although it noted that translations made directly from the original language would always be preferred. In 1985, the Akademi also held that joint translations would be eligible, and in 1997, it dispensed with the process of advertising for nominations and replaced it with invitations for recommendations from advisory boards and Committee members. As of 2006, 268 prizes have been awarded to 256 translators.