mami wears the birkhey topi

two months ago, mami says she visualised herself with a birkhey topi (a la bhanubhakta's topi). she says she was so surprised and wondered how the image of herself, draped always is such femininity, could ever match wearing a men's topi. she felt so conscious about the visualisation that she did not even share it with anyone.

and then two weeks ago, she got a call from rama sharmaji of the nepali shikshya parishad saying that she was the recipient of this year's adikabi bhanubhakta puraskar. mami says she was dumbfounded for some time.

she was going to be the first female recipient of the prestigious award that comes with a sum of one lakh rupees, (rs. 101,101, to be exact) a handwritten citation, and most importantly, the birkhey topi. the organisers had wondered what to do with the topi as part of the award. mami quelled their doubts by saying she would consider it an honour to wear a topi like bhanubhakta.

and on 13th july (asar 29), the 195th birth anniversary of bhanubhakta, mami wore a birkhey topi, placed on her head by poet madhav prasad ghimire.


everyone said it looked good on her.. made her look like her brother, sanomama -- the late krishna prasad pant.







mami sat beside other recipients of the bhanubhakta award.. satya mohan joshi, dhramaraj thapa and bhanubhakta pokharel.



the ceremony took place at lekhnath sadan in sorakhuttey pati. the hall was filled with literary figures, family and friends too.







kabi madhab prasad ghimire presented mami with the award, the citation, the topi, the garland as well as the award amount.

in her written speech mami announced that she was gifting half of the award money to augment the bhanubhakta puraskar trust, and the other half to be shared with the samata school and the pranavananda ashram.

earlier the children from vishwa hindu vidyapeeth sang bhanubhakta's chapala abala haru ek sur ma.