The DSC prize for South Asian Literature

2012 Prize Announcement Coverage

DSC Prize — Wed, 25 Jan 2012 08:36:22 +0000

Announcing the 2012 Prize

DSC Prize — Sat, 21 Jan 2012 15:59:06 +0000

Shehan Karunatilaka awarded the DSC Prize for South Asian Literature 2012

Sri Lankan debut novelist wins prestigious US $50,000 prize for his book Chinaman

Jaipur, January 21^st 2012: The DSC Prize for South Asian Literature 2012 was awarded to Singapore based Sri Lankan author Shehan Karunatilaka for his book Chinaman (Random House, India), a novel that explores cricket as a metaphor to uncover a lost life and a lost history. Chinaman skilfully uses sport and the notion of fair play to look at Sri Lanka in a fresh and exciting way.

The US $50,000 DSC Prize 2012 was awarded to Shehan Karunatilaka at a memorable ceremony attended by eminent literary figures, renowned authors, members of the media fraternity and a diverse literary audience. The event took place at the DSC Jaipur Literature Festival, one of the biggest literary festivals in the region. The DSC Prize along with a unique trophy was awarded to Shehan Karunatilaka by Her Majesty Ashi Dorji Wangmo Wangchuck, Queen Mother of Bhutan.

A total of six authors were part of the Shortlist for the DSC Prize 2012 from which the winner was announced. The other shortlisted authors were U.R. Ananthamurthy: Bharathipura (Oxford University Press, India, Translated by Susheela Punitha), Chandrakanta: A Street in Srinagar (Zubaan Books, India, Translated by Manisha Chaudhry), Usha K.R: Monkey-man (Penguin/Penguin India), Tabish Khair: The Thing About Thugs (Fourth Estate/HarperCollins-India), and Kavery Nambisan: The Story that Must Not Be Told (Viking/Penguin India)

The DSC Prize was judged by a distinguished Jury chaired by Ira Pande along with Dr. Alastair Niven, Dr. Fakrul Alam , Faiza S Khan and Marie Brenner. The Shortlist was announced in October 2011 at the DSC South Asian Literature Festival in UK.

Commenting on the occasion Ira Pande, Jury chairperson said “The jury unanimously chose this year’s winner. While this fact in itself is a historic one for book juries are notorious for spirited battles over lists and winners, let me add that this year’s winner is also important for several other reasons. The winning title is a brilliant narration of all that is both great and sad about South Asia and in that sense it brings a world to the reader that needs to be seen outside this region. No longer are novelists who write of violence, breakdown of communities and the old way of life able to speak the whole truth about our world.”

Speaking further about the winning book, she said, “The speech rhythms of smaller towns and indigent characters, so seldom seen and heard, are brought alive by a writer who handles character and speech with consummate ease. That world has long needed a suitable metaphor and he has discovered it: Cricket. Set in Sri Lanka, as an epic search for a lost player, Chinaman by Shehan Karunatilake is both a portrait of a lost way of life and a glimpse into the future this vast and vivid region is fated to occupy.”

Shehan Karunatilaka’s debut novel Chinaman (Random House, India) was awarded the DSC Prize for South Asian Literature 2012, recognizing it as the best work of fiction pertaining to the South Asian region, published in the last year in English, including translations into English.

Manhad Narula, Director DSC Limited and Founder of the DSC Prize, commented on the occasion saying, “Congratulations to Shehan Karunatilaka for a book that represents the best South Asian writing and winning the DSC Prize for South Asian Literature 2012. I thank the jury members who’ve had the difficult task of choosing a winner among several exceptional works submitted this year. Now in its second year running, the DSC Prize has built a strong and engaging platform for the recognition of South Asian writing. We are committed to showcasing the best writing in the region and bringing it to a larger global audience”

The DSC Prize for South Asian Literature was instituted in January 2010 to celebrate writing that highlights the South Asian region, its people, culture and diaspora. The DSC Prize, which has been envisioned as a unique and prestigious award, recognizes the literary works of authors across the globe writing on South Asia, transcending the origin or ethnicity of the author. The DSC Prize for South Asian Literature is one-of-its-kind in the region and aims at recognizing literary work that is redefining the understanding of South Asia across the globe. The DSC Prize for South Asian Literature 2011 was awarded to HM Naqvi for his debut novel Home Boy (HarperCollins India). The DSC Prize is guided by an international Advisory Committee of eminent literary personalities comprising MJ Akbar, Urvashi Butalia, Tina Brown, William Dalrymple, Lord Meghnad Desai, David Godwin, Surina Narula, Senath Walter Perera, Nayantara Sehgal and Michael Worton.

Note to the Editor: DSC Limited Literary Initiatives

In its endeavour to contribute to social growth and create social infra wealth, DSC Limited has identified the promotion of literature as a key initiative. The company firmly believes that promoting literature helps build the character of society, just as its infrastructure projects help create the infra wealth of the nation. As a major move towards promoting literature, the company has been the principal sponsor of the DSC Jaipur Literature Festival for the last five years. During this period, this event has grown to become the largest literary event of its kind in the region. As an extension of its vision to promote South Asian literature, DSC Limited recently instituted the DSC Prize for South Asian Literature, with a prize money of US $ 50,000. This unique prize is a celebration of the rich and varied world of literature belonging to the South Asian region.

In order to further strengthen its association with South Asian literature, DSC Limited recently presented the DSC South Asian Literature Festival which was held in London in October 2011 . With growing interest and a robust following of South Asian writing in the UK, this event was a critical step in extending the company’s patronage of literature to a global platform.

For further information, please contact: Hanmer MS&L

Vidushi Khera
Cell: +91 98104 98106
vidushi.khera@hanmermsl.com

Rashi Mehrotra
Cell: +91 995894111
rashi.mehrotra@hanmermsl.com

Ashima Chetan
Cell: +91 8800889965
ashima.chetan@hanmermsl.com

DSC Prize 2012 Shortlist Announcement Coverage

DSC Prize — Fri, 02 Dec 2011 07:24:07 +0000

Web Coverage:

DSC Prize 2012 Longlist Announcement Coverage

DSC Prize — Wed, 26 Oct 2011 03:01:32 +0000

DSC Prize 2012 Shortlist Announced

DSC Prize — Tue, 25 Oct 2011 14:05:17 +0000

Anticipation around the 2^nd annual DSC Prize for South Asian Literature continued to rise last night as the shortlist was announced at a prestigious gala event at London’s Globe Theatre. Long-listed authors, publishers, London’s literati, ambassadors from the South Asian region gathered together for the event, which was also the finale of the 2011 DSC South Asian Literature Festival in London. Guests were treated to a stirring performance by award-winning producer and Tabla player Talvin Singh, alongside Sarod maestro Soumik Datta, while the winner of the first DSC Prize, Pakistani writer H.M. Naqvi gave a dazzling reading from his winning novel Home Boywhich has just been published by Penguin in the UK.

After intense deliberation over the longlist comprising 16 books, the eminent Jury, chaired by Ira Pande along with renowned literary figures Dr. Alastair Niven, Dr. Fakrul Alam, Faiza S. Khan, and Marie Brenner, selected the shortlist for this major international award. The DSC Prize for South Asian Literature has a prize value of $50,000 for the best writing about the South Asian region.

The shortlist of 6 books for the DSC Prize for South Asian Literature, 2012 is as follows:

U.R. Ananthamurthy: Bharathipura (Oxford University Press, India, Translated by Susheela Punitha)
Chandrakanta: A Street in Srinagar (Zubaan Books, India, Translated by Manisha Chaudhry)
Usha K.R: Monkey-man (Penguin/Penguin India)
Shehan Karunatilaka: Chinaman (Random House, India)
Tabish Khair: The Thing About Thugs (Fourth Estate/HarperCollins-India)
Kavery Nambisan: The Story that Must Not Be Told (Viking/Penguin India)

Speaking on the occasion, Chairperson of the Jury, Ira Pande said, “The task before the jury was not easy; the main hurdle was how to sift the clever and stylish from the real and true tale. All of us were united in feeling that a novel by any definition must have a strong tale to tell. While there will always be legitimate differences between jury members on individual choices, I think we were fortunate this year in arriving at a broad consensus on what we were looking for. I have a twinge of regret, as doubtless other jury members do too, that we could not include some of the terrific novels we had before us but that has been a cross that every jury has had to carry.

The DSC Prize for South Asian Literature is an agency of acquainting readers to the rich diversity of South Asia’s myriad language traditions. This is just the second year since this Prize was instituted and I am sure that in the coming years, it will bring forward a world whose time to take centre-stage has arrived.”

The DSC Prize for South Asian Literature is a first-of-its-kind initiative as it is specifically focused on the richness and diversity of South Asian writing. The prize is also unique since it is not ethnicity driven in terms of the author’s origin and is open to any author belonging to any part of the globe as long as the work is based on the South Asian region and its people.

In January 2011, the inaugural DSC Prize was won by Pakistani author HM Naqvi for his debut novel Home Boy (HarperCollins India) which has gone on to become one of the most celebrated recent renditions on South Asia. Following the announcement, Home Boy was acquired by Hamish Hamilton [Penguin Books] in the UK. It is now being published by Penguin in the UK and British Commonwealth, realizing one of the central visions of the prize, which is to propagate and present South Asian writing to a larger global audience.

The DSC Prize initiative has been guided by an international Advisory Committee comprising MJ Akbar, Urvashi Butalia, Tina Brown, William Dalrymple, Lord Meghnad Desai, David Godwin, Surina Narula, Senath Walter Perera, Nayantara Sehgal and Michael Worton.

Thanking the Jury, Mr Manhad Narula, Director, DSC Limited said, “The jury had a challenging task in narrowing down the longlist to the shortlist of the most deserving six. These represent the finest works of fiction pertaining to the South Asian region and I extend my best wishes to each one of the shortlisted authors. I now look forward with excitement to the jury announcing the final winner of the DSC Prize at the DSC Jaipur Literature Festival in January 2012″

The winner of the second DSC Prize for South Asian Literature will be announced at the DSC Jaipur Literature Festival on 21^st January 2012. The prize will be awarded for the best work of fiction pertaining to the South Asian region, published in English, including translations into English.

Please visit www.dscprize.com for more details.

The DSC South Asian Literature Festival 2011 took place in London from 7-24th October. Please visit www.dscsouthasianlitfest.com for details.

Notes to Editors: DSC Limited Literary Initiatives

As a major move towards promoting literature, the company has been the principal sponsor of the DSC Jaipur Literature Festival for the last five years. During this period, this event has grown to become the largest literary event of its kind in the region.

As an extension of its innate vision to promote South Asian Literature, DSC Limited instituted the DSC Prize for South Asian Literature, with a prize money of USD 50,000. This unique prize is a celebration of the rich and varied world of literature belonging to the South Asian region.

In order to further strengthen its association with South Asian Literature, DSC Limited is also presenting the DSC South Asian Literature Festival held in London for the second year this October. With growing interest and a robust following of South Asian writing in the UK, this event is a critical step in extending the company’s patronage of literature to a global platform.

DSC Prize 2012 Shortlist – Author notes

DSC Prize — Tue, 25 Oct 2011 13:50:09 +0000

U.R. Ananthamurthy: Bharathipura (Oxford University Press, India, Translated by Susheela Punitha)

Perhaps the most significant work in caste literature since Premchand’s Godan (1936), Bharathipura reveals U.R. Ananthamurthy’s preoccupation with moving beyond caste and class interests. First published in 1973, Bharathipura is about the practice of untouchability in a traditional society that is evolving into modernity through new economic forces brought in by a certain class of people. When the town’s wealthiest landlord returns home, multiple realities unfold. Violent and unexpected events follow Jagannatha’s attempts to revolutionize everyone and everything by linking his own transformation to the changes he wishes to orchestrate.

U.R. Ananthamurthy, a teacher of English literature and one of India’s leading contemporary writers, does all his creative writing in Kannada. A Jnanpith awardee and author of five novels, including the widely acclaimed Samskara (English translation, OUP 1976), he has six collections of short stories, five collections of poems, a play, and sixteen volumes of critical writings. He was Vice-Chancellor, Mahatma Gandhi University (Kerala) and President, Central Sahitya Akademi.

Susheela Punitha has taught undergraduate and postgraduate courses in English language and literature. Her publications include children’s fiction for UNICEF and course books in spoken English.

Chandrakanta: A Street in Srinagar (Zubaan Books, India, Translated by Manisha Chaudhry)

Srinagar, capital city of the famed ‘paradise on earth’, Kashmir. Ailan Gali, a deep, dark narrow lane that lies at its heart, where houses stand on a finger’s width of space and lean crookedly against each other, so deep, so narrow, so closely connected that even thieves do not dare enter. Yet people live and love here, they cling on to their old ways, they share stories and food, joys and sorrows, sufficient unto themselves. But the outside world beckons, youngsters begin to leave, and slowly change makes its way into Ailan Gali only to find its hitherto hidden mirror-image – the change that has insidiously been working its way into the lives of those who are the gali’s permanent residents. This funny, poignant, evocative story of a Kashmir as yet untouched by violence – but with its shadows looming at the edges – is a classic of Hindi literature, available in English translation for the first time.

Chandrakanta Studied in Srinagar and Rajasthan and published her first story in 1967 in Kalpana. She has since written and published many novels and short story collections as well as a volume of poetry.

Manisha Chaudhry has translated stories, novels and documents for a range of publishing houses and organisations, from both Hindi and English. She is currently Head, Content Development with Pratham Books.

Usha K.R: Monkey-man (Penguin/Penguin India)

3 January 2000. It is the start of the new millennium. On Ammanagudi Street in Bangalore, a strange creature is spotted. As the beast seizes the imagination of the city, the first people to sight it—Shrinivas Moorty, a teacher in a local college, Pushpa Rani, who works in a call centre, Neela Mary Gopalrao, secretary to an influential man, and Sukhiya Ram, her office boy—are invited to talk about it on Bali Brums’s hugely popular radio show. What was it that they saw? A bat? A malevolent avatar? A sign of the displeasure of the gods? The grotesque mascot of a city that is growing too fast and crumbling too soon? Or merely a monkey that has lost its way?

Usha K.R. is the author of the novels Sojourn, The Chosen and A Girl and a River was shortlisted for the Commonwealth Writer’s Prize, 2008, and won the Vodafone Crossword Award, 2007.

Shehan Karunatilaka: Chinaman (Random House, India)

Why am I chasing a man who only played four test matches for Sri Lanka? A man who denied me interviews, delighted me on occasion, disappointed those he played with, and disappeared three years ago.’ Retired sportswriter, W.G. Karunasena is dying. He will spend his final months drinking arrack, upsetting his wife, ignoring his son and tracking down Pradeep S. Mathew, an elusive spin bowler he considers ‘the greatest cricketer to walk the earth’. On his quest to find this unsung genius, W.G. uncovers a coach with six fingers, a secret bunker below a famous stadium, an LTTE warlord, and startling truths about Sri Lanka, cricket and himself. Ambitious, playful and strikingly original, Chinaman is a novel about cricket and Sri Lanka – and of Sri Lanka through his cricket.

Shehan Karunatilaka has written advertisements, rock songs, travel stories and basslines. Chinaman is his first novel.

Tabish Khair: The Thing About Thugs (Fourth Estate/HarperCollins-India)
Amir Ali leaves his village in Bihar to travel to London with an English captain, William Meadows, to whom he narrates the story of his life – the story of a murderous thug. While Meadows tries to analyse the strange cult of the Indian Thug, a group of Englishmen sets out to prove the inherent difference between races by examining their skulls – with bizarre consequences. Set in Victorian London, this story of different voices from different places draws intricate lines of connection from the nineteenth to the twenty-first century, between England and India, across individual and cultural differences.

Tabish Khair is an acclaimed poet and novelist whose recent novels have been shortlisted for the Encore Award (UK) and the Crossword Prize (India). Translated into various languages, his works include Where Parallel Lines Meet, Babu Fictions: Alienation in Indian English Novels, The Bus Stopped, Filming: A Love Story, The Glum Peacock and The Gothic Postcolonialism and Otherness: Ghosts from Elsewhere.

Kavery Nambisan: The Story that Must Not Be Told (Viking/Penguin India)

Simon Jesukumar, an ageing widower, aspires to do something worthwhile with what remains of his circumscribed, frustratingly blameless, cocooned middle-class life. His aspirations are stirred by his nagging guilt about the slum next door—incongruously and deludedly named ‘Sitara’. The well off residents of his colony use the inhabitants of Sitara for menial jobs but ignore their real needs. Simon’s friendship with his errand boy Velu, and the strangely gifted Thatkan, propels him towards others from the slum—Swamy, the schoolteacher who is also the butcher; ‘Doctor’ Prince who has no medical degree; the belt-buckle factory owner who employs children to melt brass for buckles; Tailorboy, who has thirteen fingertips to please women; the bizarre and inscrutable Baqua; and Nayagan the Leader, optimistically called ‘Merciful Diamond’, whose party bosses consider Sitara to be nothing more than a captive vote bank. As the story plunges into the heart of the slum—bringing the most unlikely individuals to the brink of collision—Simon begins to understand that good intentions and small acts of kindness achieve little when faced with the problems of a stratum of humanity he knows next to nothing about. Simon’s dilemma is ours: how can, and how should the rich (and the not-so-rich) help the poor?

Kavery Nambisan graduated from St John s Medical College, Bangalore, and did her surgical training and FRCS in England; since then she has devoted a large part of her working life to practice in rural India. She is the author of several novels including The Scent of Pepper and Hills of Angheri. She lives in Lonavla with her husband Vijay Nambisan.

Announcement of the DSC Prize Longlist for 2012

DSC Prize — Wed, 14 Sep 2011 06:43:21 +0000

New Delhi, September 14, 2011: The Longlist of 16 titles for the 2012 edition of the DSC Prize for South Asian Literature was announced today. The longlisted books, which represent the best works of fiction pertaining to the South Asian region, include an interesting mix of established as well debut novelists, along with three translated entries.

The longlisted entries contending for the prestigious US $50,000 award are:

Omair Ahmad: Jimmy the Terrorist (Hamish Hamilton/Penguin India)
U.R. Ananthamurthy: Bharathipura (Oxford University Press, India, Translated by Susheela Punitha)
Chandrakanta: A Street in Srinagar (Zubaan Books, India, Translated by Manisha Chaudhry)
Siddharth Chowdhury: Day Scholar (Picador/Pan Macmillan, India)
Kishwar Desai: Witness the Night (HarperCollins/HarperCollins-India)
Namita Devidayal: Aftertaste (Random House, India)
Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni: One Amazing Thing (Hamish Hamilton/Penguin India)
Manu Joseph: Serious Men (Fourth Estate/HarperCollins, India)
Usha K.R: Monkey-man (Penguin/Penguin India)
Shehan Karunatilaka: Chinaman (Random House, India)
Tabish Khair: The Thing About Thugs (Fourth Estate/HarperCollins-India)
Jill McGivering: The Last Kestrel (Blue Door/HarperCollins-UK)
Kavery Nambisan: The Story that Must Not Be Told (Viking/Penguin India)
Atiq Rahimi: The Patience Stone (Chatto & Windus/Random House-UK, Translated by Polly McLean)
Kalpish Ratna: The Quarantine Papers (HarperCollins-India)
Samrat Upadhyay: Buddha’s Orphan (Rupa Publications, India)

The announcement, at the Claridges Hotel in the capital, was preceded by an insightful discussion between authors Tarun Tejpal, Namita Gokhale and Sanjoy Roy of Teamwork Productions exploring ‘The Question of Identity: South Asian Fiction in Perspective’ amongst a gathering of authors, publishers and media persons.

The longlist was chosen from close to 60 entries received by the DSC Prize Secretariat earlier this year and reviewed over the past 3 months, by a five member jury comprising Dr. Alastair Niven, Dr. Fakrul Alam, Faiza S Khan, Ira Pande (Chair of the jury) and Marie Brenner. The Jury has assessed and identified these exemplary works of fiction that voice the dynamic and eclectic nature of the South Asian region and culture.

Commenting on the Longlist and the jury experience, Chairperson of the Jury, Ira Pande said, “The longlist of the 2012 DSC Prize is an interesting mix of 16 titles chosen after a careful consideration of various styles, languages and subject matter. To my mind, it reflects the best of the South Asian literary tradition: a wide landscape of rural and urban life, intricate rituals of story-telling and an indication of its evolving form. This is the East, seen as it is by some of the most promising novelists of Nepal, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, Pakistan and India, and as it appears to those who live elsewhere”

The jury will now deliberate on the longlist over the next month and the shortlist for the DSC Prize will be announced on Monday, October 24, 2011 at the Shakespeare Globe in London on the culmination of the DSC South Asian Literature Festival in UK. The winner will be subsequently declared at the DSC Jaipur Literature Festival in January 2012.

Speaking on the occasion, Manhad Narula, Founder of the Prize, said, “This year’s longlist makes for an excellent reading list and each book is a distinct example of the definitive writing that has emerged on South Asia today. I am delighted that the DSC Prize is able to provide a global platform to recognize such fine works and present them to a wider audience. Up next, the jury has the tough task of arriving at the shortlist and we look forward to that milestone at the end of October. I extend my heartiest congratulations to the authors who have made it to the DSC Prize 2012 Longlist.”

In January 2011, the inaugural DSC Prize was won by Pakistani author HM Naqvi for his debut novel Home Boy (HarperCollins India) which has gone on to become one of the most celebrated recent renditions on South Asia. Post the announcement, Home Boy is now also being published in the British Commonwealth apart from its existing editions, realizing one of the central visions of the prize, which is to propagate and present South Asian writing to a larger global audience.

The DSC prize is guided by an international Advisory Committee comprising MJ Akbar, Urvashi Butalia, Tina Brown, William Dalrymple, Lord Meghnad Desai, David Godwin, Surina Narula, Senath Walter Perera, Nayantara Sehgal and Michael Worton. The prize is not ethnicity driven in terms of the author’s origin and is awarded for the best work of fiction based on South Asia, published in English, including translations into English.

For media queries, please contact: Hanmer MSL

Vidushi Khera
E: vidushi.khera@hanmermsl.com
M: +91 98104 98106

Ashima Chetan
E: ashima.chetan@hanmermsl.com
M: +91 88008 89965

Notes to the Editor

About the DSC Prize for South Asian Literature

The DSC Prize for South Asian Literature, instituted in January 2010, is now in its second year. The prize celebrates writing that highlights the South Asian region, its people, culture and diaspora. The DSC Prize, which has been envisioned as a unique and prestigious award, recognizes the literary works of authors across the globe writing on South Asia, transcending the origin or ethnicity of the author. The Prize is open to any author belonging to any part of the globe as long as the work is based on the South Asian region and its people. The DSC Prize for South Asian Literature aims at recognizing literary work that is redefining the understanding of South Asia across the globe. For more information please visit www.dscprize.com.

About DSC Limited

DSC Limited, the flagship company of the DSC Group, is one of the fastest growing infrastructure developers in India with a strong presence in Roads & Expressways, Railways, Urban Infrastructure, Power and Real Estate. It has achieved this position of leadership in a short span of 9 years. The organization is focused on its mission of ‘Creating Infrawealth’ – infrastructure that creates wealth for the nation. To deliver on this promise, DSC Limited has been creating assets that aid the nation in realizing its diversified growth across various sectors.

About DSC Limited’s Literary Initiatives

In its efforts to contribute to social growth and create social infrawealth, DSC Limited has identified the promotion of literature as a key initiative. The company firmly believes that promoting literature helps build the character of society, just as its infrastructure projects help create the infrawealth of the nation. As a major move towards promoting literature, the company has been the principal sponsor of the DSC Jaipur Literature Festival for the last five years. During this period, this event has grown to become the largest literary event of its kind in the region. As part of its vision of promoting South Asian literature, the most significant development has been the institution of the DSC Prize for South Asian Literature in 2010. This unique prize, which carries an award of US $50,000, is a celebration of the rich and varied world of literature belonging to the South Asian region. It has been well received by the literary fraternity globally and the first edition culminated with HM Naqvi winning the coveted prize for his debut novel Home Boy. DSC Limited is also the principal sponsor of the DSC South Asian Literature Festival, UK. With growing interest and a robust following of South Asian writing in the UK, this event is a critical platform in extending the company’s patronage of literature to a global audience.

DSC Prize Longlist for 2012

DSC Prize — Wed, 14 Sep 2011 06:42:39 +0000

» See Press Announcement

Omair Ahmad: Jimmy the Terrorist (Hamish Hamilton/Penguin India)

In Moazzamabad, Uttar Pradesh, a place that is too large to be a town and too backward to be a city, a young man stabs a police inspector and is beaten to death. The last words he speaks are, ‘My name is Jimmy the Terrorist.’ Journalists descend on the town, ‘like shrill birds’, and a long-time resident decides to tell a story that none of them will know. Jimmy was once Jamaal, son of Rafiq Ansari of Rasoolpur Mohalla, a Muslim neighborhood in a Hindu town. His story goes back a long way: to the time when Moazzamabad was named, after Aurangzeb’s son; when Rafiq was seduced by the wealth and refinements of Shabbir Manzil and married Shaista; when the Hanuman temple grew 10 storeys high and the head priest was elected mayor; when Shaista died, a mosque was brought down in Ayodhya and Rafiq became a mullah.

Omair Ahmad grew up in India and Saudi Arabia, and has worked as an analyst, reporter and political adviser in New Delhi, London and Washington. His published work includes the novels Encounters and The Storyteller’s Tale.

U.R. Ananthamurthy: Bharathipura (Oxford University Press, India, Translated by Susheela Punitha)

Susheela Punitha has taught undergraduate and postgraduate courses in English language and literature. Her publications include children’s fiction for UNICEF and course books in spoken English.

Chandrakanta: A Street in Srinagar (Zubaan Books, India, Translated by Manisha Chaudhry)

Siddharth Chowdhury: Day Scholar (Picador/Pan Macmillan, India)

Zorawar Singh Shokeen of Chandrawal is one of those Delhi musclemen who run its politics from the shadows. He owns a house in the environs of the University North Campus, which he lets out as a hostel for boys. Occasionally, he uses the hostel to host his mistress, Madam Midha. Otherwise, he recruits from among his young tenants the footsoldiers for his campus campaigns; their leader, a scrawny MA (Previous) student from Bihar — the legendary Jishnu da. It is 1992, and at this aggressively male world, ordered along the simple principles of caste, class and region, arrive two kids from Patna. The fresh-faced Pranjal Sinha and his up-for-it best friend, and the narrator of Day Scholar, Hriday Thakur. In the twilight years between adolescence and adulthood, the Shokeen Niwas boys are concerned with elections, girls and examinations. And Hriday, who hopes to be a writer some day, is drawn, like moth to flame, irresistibly to the material they provide. Forsaking his first love, he becomes trapped instead by a series of misjudgements that lead him finally to the doorstep of Madam’s house and, in it, her fourteen-year-old apple-cheeked daughter Sonya. If Hriday can be saved, it is only by the act of reading and writing.

Siddharth Chowdhury is the author of Diksha at St. Martin’s and Patna Roughcut. He studied English Literature at Zakir Husain and Hindu Colleges in Delhi University. In 2007, he held the Charles Wallace Writer-in-Residence fellowship at the University of Stirling in Scotland. Part of Day Scholar was written there. He lives in Delhi and works as Editorial Consultant with the house of Manohar.

Kishwar Desai: Witness the Night (HarperCollins/HarperCollins-India)

Durga. A fourteen-year-old girl, found all alone in a sprawling farm house tucked away in a corner of Punjab. Silent, terrified, and the sole suspect in the mass murder of thirteen members of her family. Simran. Whisky-swigging, chain-smoking unmarried social worker from Delhi. She is Durga’s sole hope, for Simran is the only one who believes that Durga may be more a victim than a suspect. As Simran tries to unravel the mystery of what really happened that night of the multiple murders, she comes in close and often uncomfortable contact with Jullundur and its people, from Durga’s enigmatic tutor Harpreet and his disfigured wife to the picture-perfect high-society Arminder and her superintendent husband Ramnath. The prejudices she encounters are deep seated and the secrets manifold. And Simran knows she cannot rest until she has uncovered the whole truth.

Kishwar Desai has worked in print and broadcast media as journalist, scriptwriter, TV anchor, producer and the head of a TV channel in India. Her first book, Darlingji: The True Love Story of Nargis and Sunil Dutt, was published by HarperCollins India in 2007. Kishwar lives between London, Delhi and Goa. This is her first novel; it has won the 2010 COSTA first novel award and was longlisted for the Man Asian Literary Prize, 2009.

Namita Devidayal: Aftertaste (Random House, India)

Diwali 1984. Mummyji, the matriarch of a prosperous mithai business family, lies comatose in a Bombay hospital. Manipulative, determined, and seemingly invincible, Mummyji has held together her family through bribes of money, endless food, and adoration.Surrounding her are her four children: the weak and ineffectual Rajan Papa who is desperately in need of cash; Sunny, the dynamic head of the business with an ugly marriage and a demanding mistress; Suman, the spoilt beauty of the family who is determined to get her hands on Mummyji’s best jewels; and Saroj, Suman’s unlucky sister, who has always lived in her shadow. Each one of them wants Mummyji to die. Aftertaste tells the story of one business family and its bitter dynamics: of resentful bahus, emasculated sons, controlling mothers-in-law, and rapacious siblings. For at the heart of the family lies money, not love. Full of rare period detail and insights into the world of Baniya families, Aftertaste is worldly, astute, and utterly riveting.

Namita Devidayal was born in 1968 and graduated from Princeton University. The Music Room, her first book, was a winner of the 2008 Vodafone Crossword Popular Book Award and was named an Outlook book of 2007. A journalist with The Times of India, Namita lives in Mumbai.

Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni: One Amazing Thing (Hamish Hamilton/Penguin India)

A group of nine are trapped in the visa office at an Indian Consulate after a massive earthquake in an American city. Two visa officers on the verge of an adulterous affair; Jiang, a Chinese–Indian woman in her last years; her gifted teenage granddaughter Lily; an ex-soldier haunted by guilt; Uma, an Indian–American girl bewildered by her parents’ decision to return to Kolkata after twenty years; Tariq, a young Muslim man angry with the new America; and an enraged and bitter elderly white couple. As they wait to be rescued—or to die—they begin to tell each other stories, each recalling ‘one amazing thing’ in their life, sharing things they have never spoken of before. Their tales are tragic and life-affirming, revealing what it means to be human and the incredible power of storytelling.

Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni is the author of fifteen books including the award-winning short story collection Arranged Marriage, the novels Sister of My Heart, The Mistress of Spices and The Palace of Illusions. Her work has been translated into eighteen languages, and two of her novels have been made into films. Her writings have appeared in various publications including The Atlantic Monthly and The New Yorker, and have been published in The Best American Short Stories, The O. Henry Prize Stories, and the Pushcart Prize anthology. Divakaruni also writes for children. She is the Betty and Gene McDavid Professor of Creative Writing at the University of Houston.

Manu Joseph: Serious Men (Fourth Estate/HarperCollins, India)

Ayyan Mani appears to be just another man in Bombay, stranded in the rot of a good marriage, an unremarkable life and a dead-end job as personal assistant to an insufferable astronomer called Arvind Acharya at the Institute of Theory and Research. To entertain himself and to give his wife the hope that they are heading towards a spectacular future, he embarks upon a secret game, weaving an outrageous fiction around his ten-year-old son. As he builds the small plots to promote the myth, he sets in motion a chain of events that soon threatens to overtake him. When the formidable reputation of Arvind Acharya, who is obsessed with the theory that microscopic extraterrestrials are falling on Earth all the time, plummets after a major scandal, and he is rocked by the vicious office politics in the institute, Ayyan sees in the crisis an opportunity to further his own game and make his son a national celebrity. But in the exhilaration of the game lurks danger.

Manu Joseph is a journalist based in Bombay. Serious Men, his first novel, is being published simultaneously in India, Britain and the US. It has also been translated into Dutch, German, French and Serbian. The author was listed among the top new novelists of 2010 by The Daily Telegraph.

Usha K.R: Monkey-man (Penguin/Penguin India)

Usha K.R. is the author of the novels Sojourn, The Chosen and A Girl and a River was shortlisted for the Commonwealth Writer’s Prize, 2008, and won the Vodafone Crossword Award, 2007.

Shehan Karunatilaka: Chinaman (Random House, India)

Shehan Karunatilaka has written advertisements, rock songs, travel stories and basslines. Chinaman is his first novel.

Tabish Khair: The Thing About Thugs (Fourth Estate/HarperCollins-India)

Amir Ali leaves his village in Bihar to travel to London with an English captain, William Meadows, to whom he narrates the story of his life – the story of a murderous thug. While Meadows tries to analyse the strange cult of the Indian Thug, a group of Englishmen sets out to prove the inherent difference between races by examining their skulls – with bizarre consequences. Set in Victorian London, this story of different voices from different places draws intricate lines of connection from the nineteenth to the twenty-first century, between England and India, across individual and cultural differences.

Jill McGivering: The Last Kestrel (Blue Door/HarperCollins-UK)

Ellen Thomas, experienced war correspondent, returns to Afghanistan’s dangerous Helmand Province on assignment, keen to find the murderer of her friend and translator, Jalil. In her search for justice in a land ravaged by death and destruction, she uncovers disturbing truths. Hasina, forced by tradition into the role of wife and mother, lives in a village which is taken by British Forces. Her only son, Aref, is part of a network of underground fighters and she is determined to protect him, whatever the cost. Ellen and Hasina are thrown together—one fighting for survival, the other searching for truth—with devastating consequences for them both.

Jill McGivering has worked in journalism for 25 years. She is currently a senior foreign news journalist with the BBC having previously held the position of South Asia Correspondent (based in Delhi). Now based in London, she travels extensively for the BBC including assignments to Afghanistan and China. She has already written non-fiction, short fiction and plays. The Last Kestrel is her first novel.

Kavery Nambisan: The Story that Must Not Be Told (Viking/Penguin India)

Atiq Rahimi: The Patience Stone (Chatto & Windus/Random House-UK, Translated by Polly McLean)

A young woman prays at her husband’s bedside as he lies in a coma with a bullet in his neck. From outside come the sounds of tanks, gunshots, screaming and, most terrifying of all, silence. Inside, her two frightened daughters call to her from the hallway. As she tries to keep her husband alive, the woman rages against men, war, culture, God. Even as her mind appears to unravel, she becomes intensely clear-sighted. Now is her chance – her first ever – to speak without being censored. Her husband’s body reminds her of the legend of the patience stone, a stone that hears all confessions until it explodes, and finally, spurred to new heights of daring, she spills out her most explosive secret.

Born in Afghanistan in 1962, Atiq Rahimi fled to France in 1984. There he has made a name as a writer, film- and documentary- maker of exceptional note. His first novel, Earth and Ashes, was widely acclaimed and his film of the book was in the Official Selection at Cannes, 2004. He is adapting his second novel, A Thousand Rooms of Dream and Fear, for the screen. Since 2001, he has returned to Afghanistan many times to set up a Writers’ House in Kabul and offer support and training to young writers and film-makers. He was the winner of the Prix Goncourt Prize 2008 for The Patience Stone (Syngué Sabour), his first novel to be written in French. He lives in Paris

Kalpish Ratna: The Quarantine Papers (HarperCollins-India)

That first Sunday in December, while the Prime Minister in India dozed in Delhi, lesser things happened to lesser people in Bombay. Mohammad Yunus doused his clothes with kerosene and struck a match. Balkrishna More leaned out over the frenzied maha-aarati in the street and jumped to his death. In a shuttered room in Girgaum, three old men waited for an answer. Enraptured, Radhika and Anwar were oblivious to the nasal monotone on BBC. Who saw it first? It was there, happening right before them. A saffron ant crawled up the black dome. Then one more. Then another. Then a swarm of them. And then madness spilled every which way. In 303, Nandanvan Apartments, Ratan Oak looked out of the window and discovered he’d been living in the wrong house all his life.

So begins, The Quarantine Papers, a story of love and death in Bombay, Kalpish Ratna weaves history and medicine, passion and betrayal, music and murder in a novel where the palimpsest that is Bombay gets written over and again in hate and is sometimes redeemed in love.

Ishrat Syed & Kalpana Swaminathan are surgeons. The anonym Kalpish Ratna is an almost-anagram of their first names. The Quarantine Papers is their first Ratan/Ramratan Oak novel.

Samrat Upadhyay: Buddha’s Orphan (Rupa Publications, India)

Called “a Buddhist Chekhov” by the San Francisco Chronicle, Samrat Upadhyay’s writing has been praised by Amitav Ghosh and Suketu Mehta, and compared with the work of Akhil Sharma and Jhumpa Lahiri. Upadhyay’s new novel, Buddha’s Orphans, uses Nepal’s political upheavals of the past century as a backdrop to the story of an orphan boy, Raja, and the girl he is fated to love, Nilu, a daughter of privilege. Their love story scandalizes both families and takes readers through time and across the globe, through the loss of and search for children, and through several generations, hinting that perhaps old bends can, in fact, be righted in future branches of a family tree. Buddha’s Orphans is a novel permeated with the sense of how we are irreparably connected to the mothers who birthed us and of the way events of the past, even those we are ignorant of, inevitably haunt the present. But most of all it is an engrossing, unconventional love story and a seductive and transporting read.

Samrat Upadhyay is the author of Arresting God in Kathmandu, a Whiting Award winner, The Royal Ghosts, and The Guru of Love, a New York Times Notable Book and a San Francisco Chronicle Best Book of the Year. He has written for the New York Times and has appeared on BBC Radio and National Public Radio. Upadhyay directs the creative writing program at Indiana University.

Mumbai Press Coverage: Prize Winner’s Tour

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Chennai Press Coverage: Prize Winner’s Tour

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