Hindi readers have long been unaware of the cultural and literary genius of other Indian languages. The same perhaps could be said with equal authority about other Indian language readers. The only process that can make it possible is translation. However, translation in India has largely been limited to a one-way traffic, from various Indian languages to English. Translation between and among Indian languages has been patchy and irregular. Be that as it may, the one language from which the maximum number of literary works have been translated into Hindi is Bengali. Hindi readers have long been familiar with Rabindra Nath Tagore, Sharat Chandra, Bibhuticharan Bandopadhyay, Shankar and Mahashweta Devi. It’s a fairly long list.
However, apart from works of fiction, the other genres of Bangla or other Indian languages writing have hardly been translated into Hindi. It is, therefore, a very welcome development to see the arrival in Hindi translation of Asitkumar Haldar’s voluminous biography titled Ranger Kavi Asitkumar Haldar (The Poet of Colours).