Daijiworld Media Network – New Delhi

New Delhi, Dec 7: Konkani short story writer and novelist Damodar Mauzo won the 57th Jnanpith Award.

Mauzo was born in Goa. The 77-year-old is a short story writer, novelist, columnist and screenplay writer and has been writing in Konkani for over three decades. He has two novels, four collections of short stories and three books for young adults to his credit. In 1983, he won the Sahitya Akademi Award for his novel Karmelin, which has been widely translated into more than a dozen languages. A number of his stories have appeared in translations in many national anthologies and magazines. Some of his stories have been translated into Portuguese and French besides English.

Mauzo has several awards to his credit. He is the recipient of Katha Award for Creative Fiction 1998, the Best Dialogues Award at the Goa State Film Festival 1997, the Goa Kala Academy Award and Konkani Bhasha Mandal Award. Mauzo was also awarded a Senior Fellowship of the Ministry of Culture, Government of India for 2011-2012. He had also won the Vimala V Pai Vishwa Konkani Sahitya Puraskar award for his novel Tsunami Simon in 2011. His collection of Short stories Teresa's Man and Other Stories from Goa was nominated for the Frank O'Connor International award in 2015. He has served as a member of the executive board, general council, as well as the finance committee of the Sahitya Akademi.

Mazuo is an activist as well. He spoke against 'shrinking' freedom of expression in India following the murder of Prof MM Kalburgi in 2015. The Karnataka police found that his life was under threat during the investigations into the murder of Gauri Lankesh.

Earlier in 2008, Ravindra Kelekar became the first Konkani writer ever to win the Jnanpith Award.

The last Jnanpith was conferred on Malayalam poet Akkitham in 2019.