Assam’s Devabrata Das, Sahaisuli Brahma win Sahitya Akademi Awards 2025

Guwahati, Mar16: The Sahitya Akademi, on Monday, announced the winners of the Sahitya Akademi Awards 2025, honouring authors across 24 Indian languages for their outstanding contributions to literature.

Among this year’s recipients are writers from Assamese, Bodo and Manipuri, recognising significant works from the northeastern literary landscape.

The announcement has come months after the academy cancelled a scheduled press conference in December 2025 to declare the awards.

"Sahitya Akademi is happy to announce today its annual Sahitya Akademi Awards in 24 Indian languages recognised by it. 8 books of poetry, 4 novels, 6 books of short stories, 2 essays, 1 literary criticism, 1 autobiography and 2 memoirs have won the Sahitya Akademi Awards 2025," it said in a statement.

In the Assamese category, noted writer Devabrata Das has been awarded the honour for his novel Korhi Khelar Xadhu.

Das is widely regarded as a prominent voice of post-modernism in Assamese literature, following in the tradition of literary stalwarts such as Saurav Kumar Chaliha and Bhabendra Nath Saikia.

With a literary career spanning more than four decades, Das has authored over 25 books, covering genres such as fiction, non-fiction, screenplays, reviews and critical essays.

Over the years, he has received several notable recognitions for his contributions to literature, including the Sahityarathi Lakshminath Bezbarua Award in 2018 and the Sahitya Sanskriti Award of the literary organisation Eka Ebong Koekjan in 2010.

He had also received the Tagore Literature Award from the Sahitya Akademi in 2010.

In the Bodo language category, writer Sahaisuli Brahma won the award for her novel Dwngnwi Lama Mwnse Gathwn.

Reacting to the announcement, Assam Chief Minister Himanta Biswa Sarma congratulated the winners in a post on social media.

“I am delighted that Assam’s literary brilliance has been recognised at the Sahitya Akademi Awards 2025. Congratulations to Shri Devabrat Das for Karhi Khelar Sadhu (Assamese) and Smt. Sahaisuli Brahma for Dwngnwi Lama Mwnse Gathon (Bodo), and I wish them continued success.” he wrote.

Meanwhile, in the Manipuri category, writer Haobam Nalini received the award for her short story collection Kanglamdriba Eephut.

Nalini had earlier been honoured with the Yendrembam Surlata Puraskar by the Sahitya Seva Samiti Manipur in 2020 for the same work.

Apart from these, the Sahitya Akademi Awards 2025 were also conferred on writers in several other languages, including Bengali, Dogri, English, Gujarati, Hindi, Kannada, Kashmiri, Konkani, Maithili, Malayalam, Marathi, Nepali, Odia, Punjabi, Rajasthani, Sanskrit, Santali, Sindhi, Tamil, Telugu and Urdu.

In total, 24 authors across 24 Indian languages have been honoured this year, recognising outstanding literary works spanning genres such as novels, poetry, essays, memoirs, literary criticism and short stories.