RANCHI: President Pranab Mukherjee today fondly recalled his long association with the Nikhil Bharat Banga Sahitya Sammelan, whose first annual conference was presided by Rabindranath Tagore.
“Founded in 1922, it was initially ‘Probasi Banga Sahitya Sammelan’ and Rabindranath Tagore presided its first annual conference in Varanasi in 1923,” Mukherjee said here.
Addressing its 88th annual conference, the President recalled his association with the literary body for about three decades.
Mukherjee, who was its president for 12 times, said novels were introduced in Bengali literature in the mid 19th century.
Describing Michael Madhusudan Dutt as a pioneer of sorts, Mukherjee said Dutt had introduced blank verse (Amitrakshar Chhanda), epics and sonnets in Bengali language and his first epic ‘Tilottama Sambhab Kabya’, published in 1860, was the first Bengali poem written in blank verse.
The following year Dutt’s greatest work—Meghnad Badh Kabya—was published, he said.(Agencies)
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