Dr. Maheswar Neog

A multi-talented personality, Dr. Maheswar Neog was definitely a foremost authority on Indian art and culture and rightly been honored as a Fellow of the National Sangeet Natak Akademi. His holistic vision led to the recognition of Satriya dance by the Akademi. He was an Indian academic who specialized in the cultural history of the North East India especially Assam, besides being an eminent Assamese scholar and poet. He also won the Padma Shri award in the year 1974.
 

Dr. Neog was born on 7th December in the village of Kamarphadiya, which is situated on the banks of Dikhow River in Sibasagar to Manik Chandra Neog and Chandra Prabha Neog. He passed his matriculation from Kamarphadiya with flying colors and came to Guwahati for higher education. Here he joined the Cotton College and in the year 1939, he completed his bachelor’s degree with Assamese language as honors and in the year 1947, he completed post graduation in Modern Indian Language from Kolkata. In the year 1948, he joined Guwahati University as a teacher and prior to becoming the reader of Assamese Department of Guwahati University; he worked as deputy director of literary workshop of Shanti Niketan under Central Government. From 1966 to 1978, he was the Jawaharlal Nehru Professor of Guwahati University and was the Srimanta Skankardev Professor of Patiala University. He also served as the dean of Faculty of Arts of Guwahati University.
 

Contribution of Professor Neog towards Assamese art, culture and literature is remarkable. He was one of the leading dignitaries of the country in the field of academic and literature. A versatile scholar and visionary, Dr. Maheswar Neog excelled in different disciplines of study, namely language and literary history, fine arts, music, dance, drama, lexicography and orthography, historiography and hagiography, folklore, religion, just to name a few. A renowned scholar of Assam, Dr, Neog faced a lot of hurdle financially but paved his way towards becoming a great scholar bringing in name and fame for Assam. He grabbed the attention of aficionado of the art of dancing to the three Assam styles with a classical pattern in each of them. He presented full length details of the different principal forms of Ojapali and Sattriya dances. This prompted the Akademi in September 1958 to form an Expert Committee and he proved to the hilt that Assamese dance represents what may be termed as fifth school of Indian classical dance and was instrumental in getting the little known tradition of Sattra and Ojapali dance recognized for Akademi Awards. Another remarkable contribution was the skillful editing of the Srihastamuktavali by Subhankara, an old discourse on dance, popular in Assam. He is the one to take Assamese folk dance to the global podium. 

Professor Maheswar Neog was also the President of Asam Sahitya Sabha in the year 1974. In the year 1994, he was awarded the Sangeet Natak Akademi Fellowship the highest honour conferred by Sangeet Natak Akademi, India's National Academy for Music, Dance and Drama. Dr. Maheswar Neog passed away on 13th September 1995. Someone rightly said that he was the one who lived in Assam, lived for Assam and has lived Assam.