Sarah Joseph Wins SheThePeople Women Writer's Prize 2021

Sarah Joseph is the winner of SheThePeople's inaugural Women Writer's Prize 2021 for her novel Budhini. The book has been translated from Malayalam by Sangeetha Sreenivasan.

"A story of perennial appeal, Budhini is a winner in every way. Our heartfelt congratulations to Sarah Joseph, the author of this wonderful book, and translator Sangeetha Sreenivasan,"  says Prize Founder Shaili Chopra.

Published by Penguin Random House India, Budhini reimagines a real incident when Jawaharlal Nehru visited Jharkhand to inaugurate a dam across the Damodar river in 1959. Fifteen-year-old Budhini was chosen by the Damodar Valley Corporation to welcome the Prime Minister. Budhini garlanded Nehru, for which she was ostracised from her village as this was seen as an act of marriage.

The Shortlist and The Longlist

The fiction shortlist saw five other women writers along with Joseph: Ambai, Tarana Husain Khan, Krupa Ge, Selma Carvalho and Naheed Phiroze Patel. The longlist consisted of 12 diverse writers - from debut novelists to seasoned authors - who submitted everything from diaspora literature, collections of short stories and translated works.

The Jury Speaks

Jury members Preeti Gill, G Sampath and Lakshmi Subodh were faced with the difficult task of choosing from the longlist and the ">shortlist. Says jury member Preeti Gill, "The story of Budhini encapsulates India, an India that is still largely unknown and silent, whose stories are still not a part of our so-called mainstream. A strong, wonderfully written story told with empathy, it enriches our perception and understanding of an India that we often ignore."

With this prize, SheThePeople, as always and with all its endeavours, aims to shine a spotlight on women writers who often tend to go invisible under the mixed-gender lens. The award carries with it a Rs 50,000 cash prize.