Ruskin Bond, Vinod Kumar Shukla and six others named for Sahitya Akademi Fellowship

The National Academy of Letters said in a statement that the general council of Sahitya Akademi which met under the chairmanship of its president Dr Chandrashekhar Kambar announced its highest honour, the Fellowship. The others who received the Fellowship are Sirshendu Mukhopadhyay (Bengali), M Leelavathy (Malayalam), Dr. Bhalchandra Nemade (Marathi), Dr Tejwant Singh Gill (Punjabi), Swami Rambhadracharya (Sanskrit), Indira Parthasarthy (Tamil).

Bond, who has written over 300 short stories, essays and novels and more than 30 books for children besides several other works, is the recipient of Sahitya Akademi Award, Sahitya Akademi's Bal Sahitya Puraskar, Padma Shri and Padma Bhushan among other prestigious awards.

With 20 published books including poetry collections, novels, and short stories to his credit, Shukla is a member of the General Council of Sahitya Akademi. He is also the recipient of Sahitya Akademi Award, Shikhar Samman of the Madhya Pradesh Government, Hindi Gaurav Samman, Raja Puraskar, Rashtriya Maithilisharan Gupta Samman among others.

Mukhopadhyay, who is a major Bengali novelist and short story writer began his career as a teacher and later took up productive journalistic writing. He is a recipient of the Sahitya Akademi Award, Ananda Puraskar, Vidyasagar Puraskar, Saratchandra Media, and Bhaulka Puraskar.

An eminent Malayalam writer, literary critic, and educationist, Leelavathy has more than 60 published books to her credit including books on literary criticism, essays collections, and translations. Leelavathy has won many prestigious awards and honours like the Padma Shri, Sahitya Akademi Award, Kerala Sahitya Academy Award, Vallathol Award, Basheer Award, Ezhuthachan Puraskaram, and Guptan Nair Memorial Award.

Marathi author Nemade has around 15 published books which have won him honours as the Padma Shri, Sahitya Akademi Award, Jnanpith Award, H N Apte Award, Yashwantrao Chavan Award, and R S Joag Award.

Gill, an eminent Punjabi writer and scholar, has written 25 books and has translated works of Punjabi poetry, drama and fiction into English and Garcia Marquez's ''One Hundred Years of Solitude'' into Punjabi. An eminent spiritual leader and Sanskrit scholar, Rambhadracharya is the recipient of a number of awards including five gold medals at the All India Sanskrit Conference, Sahitya Akademi Award, Vishishta Puraskar, President's Certificate of Honours, Vachaspati Award, Tulasi Award, and Dev Bhumi Award among others.

Tamil writer and scholar Parthasarathy has more than 40 published books to his credit including plays, novels, collection of short stories and anthologies of novellas. He is also a recipient of the Sahitya Akademi Award, Padma Shri, Saraswati Samman, Sangeet Natak Akademi Award, Tamil Nadu Government Award, Bharatiya Bhasha Parishad Award among others.