The Sahitya Akademi Award is a literary honour in India. The Sahitya Akademi Award established in 1954. Sahitya Akademi Award is the second highest literary honour next to a Sahitya Akademi Fellowship. The award comprises a plaque and cash prize of 100000. The Award’s purpose is to recognise and promote excellence in Indian Writing and also acknowledge new trends. 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.
Sahitya Akademi Award gives these special awards to writers for significant contribution to Indian language other than the above 24 major ones and also for contributions to classical and mediaeval literature. 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 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 Samman were awarded in to Dharikshan Mishra for Bhojpuri, Bansi Ram Sharma and M.R. Thakur for Pahadi, K. Jathappa Rai and Mandara Keshava Bhat for Tulu and Chandra Kanta Mura Singh for Kokborak, for their contribution to the development of their respective languages.
On the occasion of its Golden Jubilee, Sahitya Akademi Awarded the following prizes for outstanding works of poetry in translation from Indian languages. The Akademi has seen several instances of Awards being returned or declined as an act of protest. As of 2015, the award has been returned by many writers for various reasons. 38 recipients had announced their returning of the award is protest of the rising intolerance in India under the Modi Government as also the murder of author M M Kalburgi and the Dadri lynching incident.
