AMN /WEB DESK
Banu Mushtaq’s short story collection ‘Heart Lamp’ has won the International Booker Prize in London. Ms. Banu has become the first Indian author writing in Kannada to win the prestigious International Booker Prize. Her award-winning work, Heart Lamp, is a collection of twelve short stories translated into English by Deepa Bhasthi.
The book, originally titled in Kannada Hridaya Deepa, traces decades of Mushtaq’s literary output from 1990 to 2023 and was recognized for its compelling portrayals of familial and societal conflict in Karnataka. The announcement was made at a ceremony held at Tate Modern in London on Tuesday night, where both Mushtaq and Bhasthi were present to receive the award.
Who is Banu Mushtaq
Married to Mohiyuddin Mushtaq, a businessman. Banu began writing in the 1970s, and her first story appeared in a periodical called Prajamatha in 1974.
Between 1981 and 1990, she worked as a reporter at Lankesh Patrike, a tabloid edited by poet and writer P. Lankesh (father of slain activist and journalist Gauri Lankesh).
A prolific writer, Banu has written over 60 stories in her six-decade-long writing career. Her stories have been published across six collections, and navigate themes of faith, gender, and resistance while shifting between Kannada, Urdu, Arabic, and Dakhni.
Her works include Hejje Moodida Haadi (1990), Benki Male (1999), Edeya Hanate (2004), Safeera (2006), Haseena Mattu Itara Kathegalu (2015) and Hennu Haddina Swayamvara (2022). Her story Black Cobra, included in Heart Lamp, was adapted into the award-winning film Hasina by Girish Kasaravalli.
Her stories have been translated into Malayalam, Tamil, Punjabi and Urdu besides English. She won the Karnataka State Sahitya Academy award in 1999. Earlier, an English translation of a collection of her short stories, Haseena and Other Stories, won the English PEN translation award for the year 2024. That was also translated by Deepa Bhasthi.
Despite facing criticism from her community elders and severe backlash, including an attempt on her life by a knife-wielding attacker, Banu has continued to use her words to write about Muslim families with women characters who fight for their rights and assert themselves.
