Dhaka, Feb. 27 -- Receiving an award from any institution in any field is an ecstasy and honor for an individual, but not accepting or rejecting the award is a grief for him and a great dishonor for the institution itself. We have recently experienced such an incident in the case of Bangla Academy that saddens us all.

Zakir Talukdar, an accomplished fiction writer of the time, who won Bangla Academy Sahitya Puroshkar (Bangla Academy Literary Award) for his book "Musalmanmangal" in 2014, has recently sent back the honorary crest and the prize money to the director general of Bangla Academy via courier from Natore, the awardee hails from.

We do not know whether this kind of instance is for the first time in our country as the award was re...