The Shakti Bhatt Prize is a literary award established in 2007 in memory of Indian publisher, Shakti Bhatt. Between 2008 and 2019, it was awarded for first books published in India by an author of any age in the genres of poetry, fiction, creative non-fiction and drama. From 2020 onward, the Prize has been awarded in recognition of a writer's body of work, instead of a first book. The last award will be given in 2025 to Zara Chowdhary for her memoir ''The Lucky Ones''.

Establishment

The Shakti Bhatt First Book Prize was established by an

eponym An eponym is a noun after which or for which someone or something is, or is believed to be, named. Adjectives derived from the word ''eponym'' include ''eponymous'' and ''eponymic''. Eponyms are commonly used for time periods, places, innovati ...

ous foundation in memory of Shakti Bhatt, an Indian publisher. Bhatt, the editor of Indian publishing house, Bracket Books, died following an illness in 2007. The Shakti Bhatt Foundation was established in her memory by her husband, Indian poet

Jeet Thayil Jeet Thayil (born 1959) is an Indian poet, novelist, librettist and musician. He is the author of several poetry collections, including ''These Errors Are Correct'' (2008), which won the Sahitya Akademi Award. His first novel, ''Narcopolis (book ...

, along other friends and family; the foundation funds and manages the award. The prize was first awarded in 2008 to Mohammad Hanif for his novel, '' A Case of Exploding Mangoes''. In 2020, the new Shakti Bhatt Prize was awarded to incarcerated scholars and writers

Anand Teltumbde Anand Teltumbde (born 15 July 1951) is an Indian scholar, writer, and human rights activist who is a management professor at the Goa Institute of Management. He has written extensively about the caste system in India and has advocated for the r ...

and

Gautam Navlakha Gautam Navlakha () is an Indian human rights activist and journalist. He has written on left-wing extremism and is a critic of army and state atrocities in Kashmir. He is a member of People's Union for Democratic Rights, Delhi. He is also an ...

. In May 2021, the Foundation announced that there would be no prize for 2021, and instead donated the prize money towards relief efforts relating to the

Covid-19 pandemic in India The COVID-19 pandemic in India is a part of the COVID-19 pandemic, worldwide pandemic of COVID-19, coronavirus disease 2019 () caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2). As of , according to Indian government ...

. In 2025, it was announced that the award will be discountinued from next year.

Eligibility and Criteria

Between 2008 and 2019, the Award was open to nominations of first books published during the previous year in the

Indian subcontinent The Indian subcontinent is a physiographic region of Asia below the Himalayas which projects into the Indian Ocean between the Bay of Bengal to the east and the Arabian Sea to the west. It is now divided between Bangladesh, India, and Pakista ...

within the categories of fiction, non-fiction, poetry, and drama. Eligible books were either written in English, or translated into English from other languages. Publications from

vanity press A vanity press or vanity publisher, sometimes also subsidy publisher, is a book printer that is paid by authors to Self-published, self-publish their books. A vanity press charges fees in advance and does not contribute to the development of the ...

es were excluded. In 2020, Thayil announced that the Prize would now be awarded to recognize a writer's body of work, rather than a first book. Speaking about the changes, Thayil stated, "It just seems to us that at this point (in 2020) it does not make sense to have a first book prize. When we started nobody was doing it. In time, first books came up in many shortlists. In fact, there were copycats for just first books prize as well. We just did not see the relevance. So, we wanted to give it to somebody where it will make a difference." The Award initially carried a cash prize of . In 2014, the prize amount was increased to ₹200,000.

Awards

2008-2019

2020-2025

References

{{Reflist First book awards Indian literary awards