President of India presents Asom Ratna Award and Srimanta Shankardeva Award

Guwahati, May 13: The President of India, Pranab Mukherjee presented the Asom Ratna Award (posthumously) to Late Smt. Indira Goswami and the Srimanta Shankardeva Award for the year 2008 to Sharmila Tagore on Monday at a function at Guwahati, Assam.

Speaking on the occasion, the President said he is very happy that his first visit to Assam is to confer distinction on two outstanding women of India. Both are social leaders who have contributed to the development and empowerment of women.

The President congratulated Shrimati Tagore for her rich contribution to India’s cultural life. He said as a goodwill ambassador for UNICEF and Chairperson of the Indian Film Censor Board, Sharmila Tagore has used her influence to promote initiatives aimed at bringing positive change in our society.

The President also welcomed the recognition, by the Government of Assam, of the contribution of Late Smt. Indira Goswami by awarding her the Asom Ratna Award posthumously. He said she was a legendary story teller and prolific novelist who courageously advocated social change in a very volatile period in Assam’s history. She would be particularly remembered for her role as a mediator in talks between armed militants in Assam and the Government of India. In all her works, ‘Mamoni’ as she was known, had focused on women, the disadvantaged and the oppressed in society. By creating a consciousness about these problems, she was able to sow the seeds of change.

The President said we are living in difficult times, recent incident of rape in Delhi has shaken national consciousness. We must ponder where we are and where we are going. We must reset our moral compass. Women are a symbol of power, peace, love, humanity and divinity.

The President congratulated the Government of Assam for instituting the Srimanta Sankardeva Award. He said that this award would propagate the teachings of Swami Srimanta Shankardeva, an Assamese saint, scholar and social reformer who lived in the 15th

and 16th Centuries. His Neo-Vaishnava movement repudiated caste barriers and sought to create an egalitarian civil society based on the shared values of fraternity, equity, humanism and democracy. Sankardeva had believed, “Do, therefore, regard all and everything as though they were God Himself. Seek not to know the caste of a Brahmana nor of a Chandala”. We must learn from teachings of Shankardeva. The time has come to rekindle his ideology of humanity and service to man as service to God.