Professor Maheswar Neog (7 September 1915 – 13 September 1995) was an Indian academic who specialised in the cultural history of the North East India especially

Assam Assam (, , ) is a state in Northeast India, northeastern India, south of the eastern Himalayas along the Brahmaputra Valley, Brahmaputra and Barak River valleys. Assam covers an area of . It is the second largest state in Northeast India, nor ...

, besides being an Assamese-language scholar and poet. He was a top Indologist, and his work covers all disciplines of Indian studies, folk-lore, language, dance, history, music, religion, drama, fine arts, paintings, historiography and hagiography, lexicography and orthography, epigraphy and ethnography. His research includes multi-dimensional features of Vaishnava renaissance in Assam through Srimanta Sankardev, Madhabdev, Damodardev, Haridev, Bhattadev and other Vaishnava saints of Assam. An editorial in ''

The Assam Tribune ''The Assam Tribune'' is an Indian English daily newspaper published from Guwahati and Dibrugarh, Assam. With over 700,000 copies of current circulation and a readership of over 3 million, it is the highest circulated English daily in northeaste ...

'' called him "a versatile scholar and visionary thinker with encyclopedic range." He remained Jawaharlal Nehru Professor at

Gauhati University Gauhati University also known as GU, is a collegiate public state university located in Guwahati, Assam, India. It was established on 26 January 1948 under the provisions of an Act enacted by the Assam Legislative Assembly and is the oldest un ...

and later Saint Sankaradeva Professor at

Punjabi University Punjabi University is a collegiate state public university located in Patiala, Punjab, India, Punjab, India. It was established on 30 April 1962 and is only the second university in the world to be named after a language, after Hebrew Universit ...

. He was awarded the

Padma Shri The Padma Shri (IAST: ''padma śrī'', lit. 'Lotus Honour'), also spelled Padma Shree, is the fourth-highest Indian honours system, civilian award of the Republic of India, after the Bharat Ratna, the Padma Vibhushan and the Padma Bhushan. In ...

, India's fourth highest civilian honour in 1974, also in the same year he remained the President of

Asam Sahitya Sabha The Asam Sahitya Sabha (; ) is a non Government, non profit, literary organisation of Assam. It was founded in December 1917 in Assam, India to promote the culture of Assam and Assamese literature. A branch of the organisation named ''Singapor ...

(Assam Literary Society). In 1994, he was awarded the Sangeet Natak Akademi Fellowship the highest honour conferred by

Sangeet Natak Akademi Sangeet Natak Akademi (The National Academy of Music, Dance and Drama in English language, English) is the national level academy for performing arts set up by the Government of India. It is an autonomous body of the Ministry of Culture (India) ...

, India's National Academy for Music, Dance and Drama.

Bibliography

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

References

1915 births 1995 deaths Cultural history of Assam Cultural historians Scholars from Assam Assamese-language poets Academic staff of Gauhati University Poets from Assam Asom Sahitya Sabha presidents People from Sivasagar district Recipients of the Sangeet Natak Akademi Fellowship 20th-century Indian poets 20th-century Indian historians Academic staff of Punjabi University Indian male poets Historians of Northeast India 20th-century Indian male writers {{india-academic-bio-stub