Poet Sankha Ghosh conferred Jnanpith Award

New Delhi, April 27 (IANS) Eminent Bengali poet and literary critic Sankha Ghosh was conferred the 52nd Jnanpith Award by President Pranab Mukherjee here on Thursday.

The 85-year-old poet was awarded with Sahitya Akademi in the year 1977 for his work "Baabarer praarthanaa" and in 1999, for translating Kannada play "Taledanda" into Bengali as "Raktakalyan". Ghosh was also honoured with Padma Bhushan in 2011.

"A professor of Bengali and an authority in his own right on the works of Rabindranath Tagore, Prof. Sankha Ghosh represents the fluid brilliance that characterises India's multifarious literary genius.

"It is indeed an example of his brilliant fluidity that an author who strove to master Bengali academically, expressed himself in perhaps the most difficult literary genre of poetry," said Mukherjee on the occasion.

Ghosh's poetic idiom and experiments with various poetic forms mark his creative talent. His poetry, while conveying its message, have remained free from polemics. Some of his famous works are "Adim Lata- Gulmomay", "Murkho Baro", "Samajik Noy", to name a few.

An ardent writer of Bengali poetry, his literary works reflect a rare poetic style that encompasses not only a lyrical style but also a deep reflection of the social milieu. His poetry often takes on superficiality of the society and are indeed a candid commentary on contemporary issues.