Hello reader,
Southasian literary awards have always generated their fair share of complaints and controversies. But they seem to matter more than ever now, as other avenues of literary recognition quietly shrink. Book review sections are disappearing or thinning out; there’s no shortage of writing online, of course, but very little of it carries the same kind of authority or attention that a major prize can command.
So what are awards for, really? Who do they serve, and who do they leave out? And how are these decisions made? The recent Jnanpith Award controversy makes these questions hard to ignore.
The decision by Bharatiya Jnanpith to confer its 60th award on the Tamil lyricist R Vairamuthu has prompted strong backlash from readers, writers and translators of Tamil literature. The writer B Jeyamohan called it “a grave injustice”, arguing that it diminishes the stature of modern Tamil writing. Others have called for the award to be withdrawn, pointing to the multiple allegations of sexual harassment that surfaced against Vairamuthu during the #MeToo movement.
It’s also brought back a familiar frustration about language and recognition. Tamil, for all the richness and range of its modern literature, has received the Jnanpith only twice before – a striking disparity compared to languages like Hindi or Kannada. It’s hard not to feel that something larger is at play in how literary value gets recognised and by whom.
All of this also serves as a reminder to pay attention to the literary awards that are getting it right – the ones that champion and make space for a wide range of Southasian voices and talents. At SaRB, we’ll keep trying to do our part by spotlighting literature that deserves to be celebrated.
If you believe in the kind of work we do, please consider supporting Himal. It’s what allows us to keep going and continue reading widely!
As always, I’d love to hear what you’ve been reading, or what you make of all this. Drop me a line at shwethas@himalmag.com.
The demise of Buddhist philosophy in Southasia and its journey to the east
Buddhism’s transformation on its way from India to China, Japan and Korea may offer clues to what was lost when it disappeared from its homeland
By Shashank Kela
Only seven days left – don’t miss your chance to submit to Himal Fiction Fest 2026!
We’re looking for original English-language translations of fiction, new or old, from any Southasian language. You can submit translations of short stories or excerpts from longer literary works. As always, we’re keen to spotlight work that travels across languages and contexts and brings a wide variety of writing to new audiences. You can find full details and guidelines here.
The Kalinga Literary Festival has announced the longlist for its 2026 Book Awards, bringing together a wide range of writing across Indian fiction, non-fiction, poetry, translation and debut categories. The translation category is especially notable, foregrounding regional literature and linguistic diversity, with works by Banu Mushtaq, Salma and Manoranjan Byapari. Take a look at the full longlist here.
Muse India has released the shortlist for its 2025 Translation Award, drawn from 104 entries spanning 18 Indian languages and 11 literary genres across 22 publishers. This year, the prize has prioritised lesser-known authors and translators, aiming to bring wider attention to writers yet to gain recognition. The full shortlist is available here.
The 2026 Climate Fiction Prize shortlist is also out, bringing together six novels that take on the climate crisis through a mix of forms and perspectives. Among them is the Indian writer Keshava Guha, whose novel The Tiger’s Share (Hachette India, March 2025) is in the running. Set in a polluted, politically fraught Delhi, it follows two sisters as they navigate ambition, inheritance and a strained sibling bond shaped in part by a parent’s uneasy conscience about the climate crisis.
What connects Friedrich Nietzsche and B R Ambedkar? In The Ambedkar–Nietzsche Provocations: The Genius of the Chandala and the Gospel of the Superman (Navayana, March 2026), Ankit Kawade traces this unlikely intellectual entanglement. At its centre is the Manusmriti, with its codification of caste and hierarchy forming the backdrop to both thinkers’ provocations. Kawade explores the parallels, misreadings and sharp divergences that bind Nietzsche and Ambedkar.
📖 From the Himal archives: Harish S Wankhede explores the gulf between Dalit-Bahujan and anglophone writing on B R Ambedkar.
In Lives, Land, and Labour: A Social History of Eighteenth-Century Sri Lanka (Brill, March 2026), Luc Bulten turns to the “Thombos” – 18th-century land and population registers from Dutch-controlled coastal Sri Lanka – to reconstruct the lives, labour and landholdings of tens of thousands of people. Reading this archive, Bulten traces both its colonial logic and its indigenous roots, offering a window into everyday social worlds shaped by caste, marriage, labour and land tenure.
Tara Menon’s Under Water (Riverhead Books, March 2026) traces an intense childhood friendship shaped by loss and the natural world. After her mother’s death, Marissa is taken to a small Thai island in the Andaman Sea by her marine-biologist father, where she meets Arielle. Against a backdrop of reefs, research stations and fragile ecosystems, the two form a bond, until it is ruptured by catastrophe. Years later, in New York, Marissa is forced to reckon with grief as the past resurfaces.
In The Complex (Penguin Viking, March 2026), Karan Mahajan turns to a sprawling Delhi family shaped by power, ambition and political change. As the children of a towering patriarch come of age in the late 20th century, their lives unfold across India and the United States, entangled in rivalries, betrayals and shifting loyalties. What emerges is both a family saga and a portrait of a nation in transition.
Super by Lindsay Pereira (Fourth Estate India, March 2026) follows the uneasy promise of migration. Drawn by dreams of prosperity, Sukhpreet leaves Punjab for Canada, only to find himself in a country that resists him. When his life collides with that of a struggling local man, the consequences are stark. Pereira’s novel explores aspiration, precarity and the emotional cost of chasing a better life across borders.
📖 From the Himal archives: Revisit Lindsay Pereira’s ‘Philomena Sequeira’, shortlisted in Himal’s 2019 Short Story Competition and later developed into his debut novel, Gods and Ends.
In Linguistic Resistance in Pakistan: Punjabi Language Movements After Independence (Columbia University Press, March 2026), Julien Columeau traces the struggle over language in Pakistan after Partition, as the state’s push to promote Urdu sparked resistance across regions. Focusing on Punjab, where Urdu was imposed as the language of administration and education, the book examines three movements between 1947 and 1960 shaped by Marxist, conservative and modernist currents. Drawing on archival sources and interviews, Columeau explores how questions of language, identity and power were contested in the post-independence moment.
📖 From the Himal archives: Hurmat Ali Shah unpacks how the language of state-making in Pakistan contributes to the erasure of regional languages.
In The City: An Anthology of New Indian Writing (Hammock, March 2026), the online platform Hammock brings its editorial ethos to print for the first time. Since 2023, the magazine has published new Southasian writing across forms; this debut anthology gathers that spirit into a single volume. Featuring fiction, essays and works in translation by emerging writers, The City offers a snapshot of urban India today. Selected from over 300 submissions, the collection traces the textures of city life – from housing struggles and climate anxiety to questions of class, caste, gender and what progress might mean. The result is an energetic portrait of contemporary urban experience.
Textiles from Bengal: A Shared Legacy (Mapin, March 2026), edited by Sonia Ashmore, Tirthankar Roy and Niaz Zaman, revisits the once-renowned textile traditions of Bengal, which for centuries “clothed the world” but later fell into obscurity. Focusing on the lost textile traditions of Bengal from the 16th to the 20th century, the volume traces their historical and cultural significance across present-day India and Bangladesh, shaped by colonial industrialisation, the decline of local industries and the upheavals of Partition. Richly illustrated with fabrics, maps and archival material, it offers a compelling history of Bengal’s textile past.
In The House the Press Built: Allahabad Anecdotes from the Indian Press Family (Rupa Publications, March 2026), Anjana Basu reconstructs the world of Chintamoni Ghosh, founder of the Indian Press in Allahabad and an early publisher of Rabindranath Tagore. Part publishing history, part family memoir, the book draws on the recollections of Ghosh’s descendants to evoke a vanished world of sprawling households, literary encounters and public life in a changing city – from royal celebrations to moments of political unrest. At its centre is the Indian Press itself, envisioned by Ghosh as “a permanent contribution to the nation.”
In The Future That Was: A History of Third World Feminism Against Authoritarianism (Princeton University Press, March 2026), Durba Mitra traces how women across the decolonising world, from the 1970s onwards, wrote Third World feminism into being. Across Southasia, Africa and the Caribbean, activists and scholars built a powerful body of knowledge on women, gender and sexuality – reshaping debates on equality, development and human rights while contesting the enduring forces of patriarchy and colonialism. Recovering these histories, Mitra reflects on the emancipatory futures they imagined, and why they remain only partially realised.
Until next time, happy reading!
Shwetha Srikanthan
Associate Editor, Himal Southasian
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