A nine-year-old girl stole the show at a award distribution function held at Tiruvallur marriage hall in Cuddalore on Sunday. Saidhanya, studying in Vidhyodhaya School in Thiyagarayar Nagar in Chennai, had translated S Ramakrishnan’s book Kaal Mulaitha Kathaigal to English and secured a place among one of the award winners for best translators.
The awards were for translating literary works from various languages to Tamil.
Nalli-Thisai Yettum chose the best translators and distributed the awards such as Bhasha Vibhushan and Bhasha Bhushan. Former vice-chancellor of Tamil University, Avvai Natarajan, gave away the awards to seven translators, M A Sushila (English to Tamil), Vaidhehi Herbert (Tamil to English), P Purusothaman(English to Tamil), M Govindharajan (Hindi to Tamil), N Subramaniyan(Gujarati to Tamil), N Manoharan (Malayalam to Tamil) and V Saidhanya (Tamil to English).
Speaking at the function, writer S Ramakrishnan said, “ Translators have not been acknowledged in our country. Translators take Tamil literature to other languages and vice-versa. It is only through influence of world literature, a language can grow. Hence, translation must be appreciated.”