Kathmandu:

The tenth anniversary celebrations of the establishment of the Lunkarandas Gangadevi Chaudhary Sahitya Kala Mandir was held at The Russian Cultural Centre on April 4. As has been done every year, this year too three eminent personalities — Purnaprakash Nepal ‘Yatri’, Janakprasad Humagain and Shambhujit Baskota were felicitated for their immense contribution in their respective fields of art.

Purnaprakash Nepal ‘Yatri’ was honoured with the Itihas Shiromani Baburam Acharya Shodh Samman, Humagain was honoured with the Saraswati Samman and Baskota was given the Narayan Gopal Sangeet Samman. The felicitation included a cash reward of Rs 51,000 and a citation each. The awards were presented by Lunkarandas Chaudhary, who is also the patron of the institution.

The programme also included the launch of a collection of articles written by Basanta Kumar Chaudhary named Samwad. The book was released by the chief guest for the evening litterateur Ishwor Ballav. Vice-chancellor of the Royal Nepal Academy Basudev Tripathi addressed the occasion and gave insights about the three personalities who were felicitated. The evening saw some of the most popular personalities of the country especially from the field of literature.

Purnaprakash Nepal got the title of ‘Yatri’ after having travelled through all 75 districts of the country, and has published 74 research works based on this travels, with 251 still reamaining to be published. Humagain, a children’s litterateur, has already published 30 works, while Banskota is an unparalled musician in the Nepali music world.

The Sahitya Kala Mandir was established to promote Nepali art, music, literature and culture. Till date it has felicitated 30 personalities belonging to the above mentioned fields.