Shiva GogoiNazira, 25 March, 2024: Year-long celebrations of the birth centenary of Jnanpith Award-winning author Dr Birendra Kumar Bhattacharyya are under way in Sivasagar district, with various programmes being organised to make the student community aware of the life and achievements of the literary luminary.
The organisers have already conducted a series of lectures on the celebrated author at various colleges of the district. A host of other programmes have been lined up to mark the birth centenary of Bhattacharyya, who was one of the doyens of modern Assamese literature.
The Dr Birendra Kumar Bhattacharyya Birth Centenary Celebration Committee, Sivasagar, has proposed that October 14, the birthday of Bhattacharyya, be declared a ‘State Day’ and a life-sized statue of him be made in Sivasagar town. The committee has also suggested naming an important road of Sivasagar after Birenda Kumar Bhattacharyya. It is worth mentioning that Bhattacharyya was born and bred at Safrai Tea Estate of the undivided district of Sivasagar. The proposals concerned have already been sent to the State government through the Sivasagar district commissioner.
Dr Birendra Kumar Bhattacharyya was the first Assamese recipient of the Jnanpith Award, the highest literary honour in India. He won the award in 1979 for his most outstanding work ‘Mritunjoy’ (Immortal), a classic novel based on the socio-political life in Assam in the pre-independence period, especially during the 1942 Quit India Movement led by Mahatma Gandhi. Bhattacharyya was also honoured with Sahitya Akademi Award in 1961 for his novel ‘Iyaruingam’ (People’s Dream), which is regarded as a masterpiece of Indian literature. In ‘Iyaruingam’, Bhattacharyya delves into the impact of India’s freedom struggle and the Second World War on the Tangkhul Naga society in Manipur.
Incidentally, ‘Mritunjoy’ and ‘Iyaruingam’ were the first-ever Assamese novels to win Jnanpith Award and Sahitya Akademi Award respectively. Dr Birendra Kumar Bhattacharyya was a novelist, short story writer, poet, playwright, literary critic, journalist, essayist, biographer, translator, lyricist, and travel writer all rolled into one. He has to his name 24 novels, five short story books, one poetry collection entitled ‘Sandhyaswar’, 16 plays, and lyrics of over 30 songs.
Dr Birendra Kumar Bhattacharyya is best known for his novels which are characterised by a deep sense of life, humanism and social awareness of a realist. He uses contemporary social and political events as the themes of his novels. Bhattacharyya was a liberal but believed in the socialist principles of equality, justice, freedom, democracy and humanism.
Bhattacharyya made a monumental contribution to Assamese literature when he worked as the editor of the path-breaking Assamese literary journal ‘Ramdhenu’ (1952-1963) that nurtured some of the best Assamese authors of all time.
Born to Shashidhar Bhattacharyya and Padmavati Devi on October 14, 1924, Birendra Kumar Bhattacharyya did his BSc from Cotton College, MA in Assamese from Gauhati University, and PhD with the thesis titled ‘Humour and Satire in Assamese Literature’ from the same university. He was the president of the 1983 Bongaigaon session of Asom Sahitya Sabha, president of Sahitya Akademi (1988-1993), and president of Authors Guild of India (1982). He passed away on August 6, 1997.
The year-long celebrations of the birth centenary of Bhattacharyya started on October 14, 2023 at Sibsagar College, Jaysagar with a lecture programme on the topic ‘The role of Birendra Kumar Bhattacharyya in establishing Assamese literature in the pan-Indian context’. Similar programmes have already been organised at Nazira College; Amguri College; Hem Chandra Dev Goswami College, Nitaipukhuri; Sibsagar Commerce College; Bir Lachit Borphukan College, Sivasagar; and Dikhowmukh College. Last year, Birendra Kumar Bhattacharyya poetry workshops were also organised at Demow College and Disangmukh Higher Secondary School.
Dr Birendra Kumar Bhattacharyya Birth Centenary Celebration Committee president Juga Gogoi said that in the coming days lecture programmes, seminars and workshops on Bhattacharyya’s works and philosophy of life will be organised in other higher educational institutions of the district with support from various social and cultural organisations. Singing, recitation, portrait drawing and quiz competitions are also scheduled to be held among students as part of the birth centenary celebrations of Bhattacharyya
