Bhakhar Oja Hemchandra Baruah remembered

OUR CORRESPONDENT

SIVASAGAR, May 4: Rich tributes were paid to Bhakhar Oja and compiler of famous Assamese dictionary Hemkosh, Hemchandra Baruah on his death anniversary recently by Rongpur Xahitya Xabha. To mark the occasion, a meeting was organised at the Hemchandra Baruah Park here where a large number of people took part. Dhiren Chandra Bhuyan, former president of Rongpur Xahitya Xabha, initiated the lighting of earthen lamps and said that the dictionary compiler collected the colloquial words even from thieves and thugs. “One day, a burglar outside the dictionary compiler’s house stood at midnight in wait for the man to sleep. Seeing the man still busy working, the frustrated burglar spelt out an invective, swore an abusive slang and left. Hemchandra Baruah rushed out and shouted at the burglar to repeat the word once more before leaving so that he could add the new slang in his dictionary,” Bhuyan said. Speaking on the occasion, Mridusmita Singha, chairperson of Sivasagar Municipality Board, said, “We need more persons like Hemchandra as Assamese language is facing a critical junction again.”