Prez bats for taking Indian language lit to world audience

President Pranab Mukherjee today emphasised on taking Indian language literature to the world audience as he batted for encouraging indigenous languages.
He said it's been a century that any Indian received a Nobel Prize for literature. However, he noted that during this time the Indian literature was not less rich.
"Gurudev Rabindranath Tagore won the Noble Prize over a century ago. In the period after that Indian literature has not been less rich. However, there is need to propagate the literature in India and take the creative genius of Indian languages to the world audience," Mukherjee said.
"There are some international languages, its literature is widely publicised Russian, French, Spanish, Chinese, Japanese, Arabic because of various factors. But apart from this internationally recognised languages, there are so many beautiful indigenous languages throughout the world and the challenge which exists in expressing themselves should also be encouraged," Mukherjee added.

He was speaking at a ceremony organised to confer the 51st Bhartiya Jnanpith Award, 2015 to noted Gujarati writer and poet Raghuveer Chaudhari.
The President stated that it is through translation of literature in various languages that makes it possible for a wider section of people to have access to it.

Mukherjee, however, said he prefers reading translations in Indian languages than of foreign.
He said that an eminent scholar and a Gandhian in spirit and behaviour, Chaudhari represents the fluid brilliance that characterises India's pluralistic literary genius.
"It is indeed an example of his brilliant fluidity that an author, who strove to master Hindi academically, expressed himself in Gujarati in his literary pursuit.

"Dr Chaudhari has been an ardent writer of Hindi columns as well, and his literary work has explored varied genre of poetry, prose, novels, and fictions as also commentary on contemporary issues," Mukherjee said.
He added that as a writer, who has explored existentialism in his works, analysed the functional aspect of human life and profoundly expressed his thoughts in his poetry through images and symbols, Chaudhari has rightfully joined the stellar constellation of his predecessor awardees.
"Mortal beings do not remain but their creations remain for a long time and therein lies the success of a master creator. He said that Dr Chaudhari was one such creator," Mukherjee said.

He said the authors in Jnanpith awardees list have each, excelled in celebrating linguistic diversity of the country.