Poet Sitakant Mahapatra (left) receives Kalinga Ratna award from Assam governor JB Patnaik in Cuttack on Monday. Picture by Badrika Nath Das

Cuttack, Nov. 27: Eminent poet Ramakant Rath received the prestigious Sarala Samman on the 31st foundation day of Sarala Sahitya Sansad on Monday evening and poet and literary critic of repute Sitakant Mahapatra was also conferred with the Kalinga Ratna.

Assam governor and former Odisha chief minister J.B. Patnaik honoured both the eminent personalities.

Rath received the Samman along with a cash award of Rs 50,000, a copper plaque and a citation, while Mahapatra received a silver statue of goddess Saraswati, a copper plaque and a citation.

Born in 1934 in Puri, Rath’s first work Kete Dina Ra (1962) was based on a collection of poems. His major works include Aneka Kothari (1967), Sandigdha Mrigaya (1971), Saptama Ritu (1977), Sachitra Andhara (1982) and Sri Palataka and Sri Radha (1984). Many of his poems have been translated into English and other Indian languages.

Mahapatra, 75, a former civil servant, has authored more than 70 noted titles and has won several literary awards in India including the Jnanpith Award. He is acclaimed for his poems and literary criticisms in Odia and English. “I am thankful to Sarala Sahitya Sansad for honouring me with the prestigious Kalinga Ratna Samman,” said Mahapatra.

The Sarala Samman, instituted in the name of great poet Sarala Das, is given every year to eminent litterateurs. Das, who was a passionate devotee of goddess Sarala, is the maker and first scholar to write in Odia. Of the three epics he translated into Odia – Ramayan, Mahabharat and Chandi Puran — the Mahabharat contains about 83,000 verses in two lines and 2,309 printed pages.

“Sarala Das’s Mahabharat is a unique contribution to world literature and is the first complete epic in a regional language,” said J.B. Patnaik.