Assam Government announces grant to literary bodies

GUWAHATI: While All Assam Students Union (AASU) led the anti-Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA) protest on Tuesday, Assam Chief Minister Sarbananda Sonowal held a meeting with the representatives of 22 indigenous Sahitya Sabhas (literary bodies).

The Assam government has called for a one day special session of the state assembly on January 13. Although the official notification has not mentioned the reason for the session, sources say its likely to be about the ratification of the extension of reservation for SC and ST in the Assembly as well as the Parliament for another decade.

Congress has been demanding the session must discuss CAA.


The Leader of opposition Debabrata Saikia, in a letter to the Speaker Hitendra Nath Goswami, stated, “Like Kerala, the Assam government must adopt a resolution opposing the CAA.”

The Chief Minister announced that the state government would provide Rs 10 crore to the Corpus Fund of Asom Sahitya Sabha, Rs 5 crore to Bodo Sahitya Sabha and Rs 3 crore each to the other indigenous Sahitya Sabhas as a one time grant. Accordingly, Asom Sahitya Sabha can derive an amount of Rs 80 lakh annually as interest from the corpus fund, while the Bodo Sahitya Sabha would receive Rs 40 lakh and other indigenous Sahitya Sabhas would get Rs 24 lakh annually.

The Asom Sahitya Sabha is opposing CAA and has organised protest rallies in the past.

The Chief Minister also announced that the state government would provide one time financial grant of Rs. 50,000 to one thousand new writers belonging to various communities of the state under ‘Bhasha Gaurav’ scheme. The Chief Minister hopes that this scheme will inspire young writers to engage in literary works in different indigenous languages of the state.

Sonowal urged the indigenous literary bodies to put emphasis on research works for preservation and promotion of indigenous language and culture and assured all about the help from the state government in this regard.

AASU has initiated a pledge against the CAA programme across the state on Tuesday and it will continue on Wednesday.