Eminent Marathi poet Narayan Surve passed away on Monday after brief illness in neighouring Thane district, family sources said. He was 83. Surve was a renowned social activist and actively participated in the labour movement.
Surve was born on October 15, 1926. Orphaned or abandoned soon after birth, he grew up in the streets of Mumbai, sleeping on the pavement and earning a meager livelihood by doing odd jobs. He taught himself to read and write, and in 1966 published his first book of poems Majhe Vidyapeeth (माझे विद्यापीठ ; My University). Surve actively worked in the workers' union movement in Mumbai and supported himself as a schoolteacher.
In the 1970s, he was often championed in India as well as in the Soviet Union and some Eastern bloc countries as a proletarian poet. Surve received for his poetry Golden Lotus Award, and Kabir Sammanin 1999 from the state government of Madhya Pradesh. He was a Convener of the Marathi Advisory Board of Sahitya Akademi. He presided over Marathi Sahitya Sammelan at Parbhani in 1995.
In 1998, he received a Padma Shri award from the government of India for excellence in Literature & Education. He died due to old age and after a brief illness on August 16, 2010.
More information here.
Surve was born on October 15, 1926. Orphaned or abandoned soon after birth, he grew up in the streets of Mumbai, sleeping on the pavement and earning a meager livelihood by doing odd jobs. He taught himself to read and write, and in 1966 published his first book of poems Majhe Vidyapeeth (माझे विद्यापीठ ; My University). Surve actively worked in the workers' union movement in Mumbai and supported himself as a schoolteacher.
In the 1970s, he was often championed in India as well as in the Soviet Union and some Eastern bloc countries as a proletarian poet. Surve received for his poetry Golden Lotus Award, and Kabir Sammanin 1999 from the state government of Madhya Pradesh. He was a Convener of the Marathi Advisory Board of Sahitya Akademi. He presided over Marathi Sahitya Sammelan at Parbhani in 1995.
In 1998, he received a Padma Shri award from the government of India for excellence in Literature & Education. He died due to old age and after a brief illness on August 16, 2010.
More information here.
