Outrage as Assam govt appoints dead litterateur to key script panel

Guwahati: In a bizarre turn of events, the Assam government has included a deceased litterateur on a committee tasked with revising the Assamese script.

The Cultural Affairs department recently reconstituted a 17-member committee for the "preparation of a revised proposal for a separate code chart for the Assamese script." Among the members listed is Dr. Ramesh Pathak, a renowned linguist and writer who passed away four years ago.

Dr. Pathak died on January 27, 2021, at his residence in Guwahati at the age of 79. A notification dated January 29, 2025, issued by B Kalyan Chakravarthy, Additional Chief Secretary of the Assam Cultural Affairs department, announced the committee's reconstitution, citing a partial modification of a previous notification from April 11, 2019.

The governor of Assam approved the new committee, which includes prominent figures from various fields, such as the President of Asom Sahitya Sabha, IT experts from Gauhati University, retired government officials, cultural activists, and academics.

The inclusion of Dr. Pathak, however, has sparked outrage online. Netizens have criticized the government's oversight and condemned Additional Chief Secretary B Kalyan Chakravarthy.

"This is a humiliation to the late person, and it is sheer irresponsibility of the government. Officials responsible for issuing such a faulty notification should face action," one user wrote on X (formerly Twitter).

Another user commented, "Consider the work of the officers of the Government of Assam. B Kalyan Chakraborty, an IAS officer, has included Dr. Ramesh Pathak in the committee formed for Unicode. It has been four years since Dr. Pathak's death. I think @himantabiswa should look into these things too!"