Nalini Prava Deka

Bhabananda Deka and Nalini Prava Deka

Nalini Prava Deka (1947-2014) was a writer from Assam, India. She was born in a small village called Pathsala in Assam to an Assamese family. She started writing at an early age of 15. She was famous as a children's writer and a poet. She had written more than hundred books, poems, essays and articles relating to both social and cultural matters.

Deka was also the editor of one of the 80's famous Assamese children magazines - 'Phool' (En: Flower) which was published by herself. She was one of the first women from Assam to set up a printing press in Guwahati. She inaugurated it in 1989 and due to family pressure, she had to close it in 1996. It was known as 'B N Printing Press'.

Deka was married to Assamese writer Prof. Bhabananda Deka. She completed her graduation in 2011 at the age of 64. She was doing her masters in Assamese language from Krishna Kanta Handiqui University and completed the first semester in 2013. Before she could sit for the second semester, in June 2014 she was hospitalized due to a heart attack. On June 15, 2014, Deka breathed her last at Guwahati Medical College Hospital. She was 67 years old.

Assamese writer Lakshmi Nandan Bora with Nalini Prava Deka at an event in Guwahati, Assam (Dec 24, 2011)

Nalini Prava Deka with noted Assamese writer and lyricist Eli Ahmed (2011)

Priyamvada Patel Hazarika (wife of Dr Bhupen Hazarika) with Nalini Prava Deka (2012)

Nalini Prava Deka with renowned flutist Dipak Sharma and her granddaughter Alakananda at Sharma's residence in Guwahati