Javed Akhtar to receive Namdeo Dhasal Samashti award

Poet and lyricist Javed Akhtar will be conferred with the Namdeo Dhasal Samashti Award for his contribution to literature and language at a function here on Friday, the city-based Samashti Foundation announced. Akhtar will receive the award during the Samashti Art and Literature Festival which will be held on April 11 and 12 at the Annabhau Sathe Auditorium at Byculla in Central Mumbai.

The festival, organised in the memory of renowned Marathi poet and Dalit activist Namdeo Dhasal (1949-2014), is now in its eighth year. Journalist Dnyanesh Maharao will receive the 'Satyashodhak Sanman'. IPS officer Sandeep Tamgadge, currently posted as an Additional Director General of Police in Nagaland, will receive the Namdeo Dhasal Samashti Award for ethical service in the police force and path-breaking work on sickle cell disease in Maharashtra, the foundation said in a release. Journalist Raju Parulekar, Dr Shyamal Garud, Amol Deolekar, and Advocate Disha Wadekar too will felicitated during the festival for their contribution to society, it added.

For the last eight years, Samashti Foundation has strived to create an inclusive platform where real issues can be expressed through language, performance, and creativity, said Swapnil Dhasal, newly elected president of Dalit Panther, who is also the convener of the festival.