About the Awards

• The Sahitya Akademi award is considered as the Government of India’s second-highest literary honour, following the Jnanpith prize. 
• The Akademi is under the central government’s Ministry of Culture, but works as an autonomous institution.
• Every year since its inception in 1954 (and first awarded in 1955), the Sahitya Akademi Award prizes to the most outstanding books of literary merit published in any of the major Indian languages recognised by the Akademi.
• Akademi bestows 24 prizes on literary works in the languages it has recognised, as well as an equal number of honours for literary translations from and into Indian languages.
• In addition to the 22 languages listed in the Eighth Schedule of Indian Constitution, the Sahitya Akademi has designated English and Rajasthani as the languages chosen.

Conditions of bestowing the award

• The author must be of Indian origin.
• The book/work must be an excellent contribution to the language and literature.
• When two or more works have similar worth, specific factors such as overall literary contribution and author status must be considered before awarding a prize.

Why in News?

• A new system is being introduced this year for inviting books for selection procedure of the country’s most prestigious literary awards given by the Sahitya Akademi annually. 
• For the first time, in order to select books in 24 Indian languages recognised by the Akademi for its main award for the year 2025, Sahitya Akademi has invited books directly from the authors, publishers and their well-wishers. 

https://pib.gov.in/PressReleasePage.aspx?PRID=2097806