Three Lankans honoured with Indian literary award
Nilukshika Wijerathna
As India celebrated its 75th Independence day on August 15, the Indian Government awarded 440 writers across the globe the literary honour – Gujarat Sahitya Academy award. In the list were three Sri Lankan writers, Nilukshika Dimithri Wijerathna, Thasneem Aala and Sakina Mohammed.
The Gujarat Sahitya Academy is one of the many Indian literary boards, literary unions, academic institutions and literary entities associated with Motivational Strips forum that began as a modest Facebook page three years ago and today has more than 7,300,000 visitors every month. Writers from 167 countries have joined this global writers’ fraternity.
Writing under the pen name @sakina’s_expressions, Sakina Mohammed a mum of two daughters is also the moderator for the Sri Lankan office of the forum and co-host of a literary talk show, “Voice of the Mighty Quills” on the forum.
“Currently I am working on my book ‘My Poetic Place: Journey to self discovery’ which will be on motivational themes. In addition to my Instagram and Facebook profiles, I am also developing my youtube channel, created and managed by my daughter Alefiya,” she says. Sakina is also a committee member of the initiative under the Department of Muslim Religious and Cultural Affairs– “Writers Hive”– that conducts online workshops for budding writers under the the guidance of writer and speaker Nuha Rizan.
Thasneem Aala
Her journey to becoming a poet started very young and she still cherishes her booklet of poetry compiled back in school. It was close to two years back that she found the inspiration to begin again by starting a blog and sharing it with family and friends.
Since then she has been publishing her poetry online. It was on Facebook that she stumbled across the Motivational Strips Forum. “ It has become my literary family. The guidance and support by the founder Shiju H Pallithazheth Sir is so uplifting,” she says.
Writing poems, plays and short stories since she was a child, 25-year-old Nilukshika who hails from the village of Kadaragama in Kegalle District is proud that she was recognised for the award. The writing platform she joined two years ago gave her the ability to publish her first poetry book “Little Words Of Inspiration” in New Delhi.
“Since childhood my hobby has been reading books and magazines. Later on, as a student of English Literature I was inspired by poets like Eliot, Shelley and Keats. All these drove me towards writing,” she says.
Sakina Mohammed
Having schooled at the Royal International School, Kegalle and St. Joseph’s Balika Maha Vidyalaya, Kegalle she joined the Sri Lanka Institute Of Advanced Technological Education for her higher education and is currently teaching English Language and English Literature while studying at the Open University of Sri Lanka, Kandy.
English teacher Wazeera Hassan who writes under the pen name of Thasneem Aala graduated from the University of Peradeniya and has spent the last 30 years teaching literature and having the satisfaction of seeing many of her students go on to university. She has published over a 100 articles in local magazines on a range of various topics
“It was a moment to be cherished when I was announced as one of the recipients of this prestigious literary award,” she says.
She has written two books ‘Mother is the companion to her daughter’ and ‘The historical Path of Muslim Ummah’.