Wed May 21 06:54:58 UTC 2025: **FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE**
**Kannada Author Banu Mushtaq Wins International Booker Prize 2025 for Short Story Collection ‘Heart Lamp’**
**LONDON, UK – May 20, 2025** – Indian author Banu Mushtaq and translator Deepa Bhasthi were awarded the prestigious International Booker Prize 2025 for their collaborative work on “Heart Lamp,” a collection of short stories originally written in Kannada. This marks a historic win, making “Heart Lamp” the first short story collection and the first Kannada work to receive the esteemed £50,000 award, split evenly between the author and translator.
The twelve stories in “Heart Lamp,” selected from Mushtaq’s writings spanning 1990 to 2023, offer an intimate glimpse into the lives of Muslim girls and women in India. They tackle themes of patriarchal mindsets, religious oppression, gender inequality, and the limitations placed upon women, resonating with universal experiences.
In her acceptance speech, Mushtaq emphasized the collective nature of the award, stating, “This is more than a personal achievement, it is an affirmation that we as individuals and as a global community can thrive when we embrace diversity, celebrate our differences and uplift one another.”
Max Porter, Chair of the 2025 Prize jury, lauded Bhasthi’s “radical translation which ruffles language, to create new textures in a plurality of Englishes,” praising the collection for its “beautiful, busy, life-affirming stories.”
Banu Mushtaq is the second Indian writer to win the International Booker Prize, following Geetanjali Shree in 2022. The award celebrates the power of translated literature and the importance of diverse voices in global storytelling.
Bhasthi highlighted the significance of recognizing women’s stories and expressed hope that the prize will encourage more translations from Kannada and other South Asian languages.
Other shortlisted works included books translated from French, Italian, Japanese, and Danish.
First Piper 