Bangla daily Prothom Alo conferred the "10th Prothom Alo Borsho Shera Boi 1419" (best book of the year) award on two authors through a ceremony attended by writers and readers in the capital's Hotel Ruposhi Bangla yesterday.

Parvez Hossain received the award for "Dubochor", a collection of short stories in Bangla, under the fiction category while Mainus Sultan's travelogue "Zimbabwe: Boba Pathor Salanini", was adjudged the best Bangla nonfiction.

The authors of the books, published in the last Bangla year, were presented a crest and Tk 50,000 each.

The books were selected by a group of jurists, headed by eminent educationist Prof Zillur Rahman Siddiqui and including writers Selina Hossain, Syed Manzoorul Islam, Wasi Ahmed and Bhishmadeb Choudhury.

Addressing the event, Prothom Alo Managing Editor Sajjad Sharif announced that the Bangla daily will begin conferring on young poets from this year a new annual "Jibanananda Das Award".

"The manuscript will be published by us as well,” he said. In his address, Prothom Alo Editor and Publisher Matiur Rahman mourned the recent demise of eminent litterateur, musicologist, former chief justice and chief adviser to a caretaker government Muhammad Habibur Rahman.