Renowned Hindi litterateur Amarkant received 45th Jnanpith award in a ceremony at Allahabad today. On this occasion, well known Hindi scholar and critic Prof. Namwar Singh presented a cheque of five lakh rupees and a citation and replica of Goddess Saraswati to Mr. Amarkant. The award was given for his life-time contribution to Hindi literature. The 86-year old author Amarkant has penned several novels and landmark stories.

Mr. Amarkant was born on 1st July, 1925 in Ballia district of Uttar Pradsesh. He has authored novels like “Inhee hathiyaron se”, “Sukha Patta”, and “Gram Sevika”. Some of the well-acclaimed short stories written by him, are “Diptee Collectary”,”Dopahar ka Bhojan” and “Zindagi aur Jonk” etc.. Amarkant have been writing about the people living at grassroot level, like the author himself.

Earlier on this occasion, two books- “Amarkant Ek Mulayankan” and “Amarkant Sanchayan” were also released on this occasion.

The 45th Jnanapith was awarded jointly to Amarkant and Late Srilal Shukla. The award was presented to Srilal Shukla in Lucknow just before his death.