Author Amitav Ghosh honoured with 54th Jnanpith award

ted English writer Amitav Ghosh has been houred with this year's Jnanpith Award, a literary award given to an author for "outstanding contribution towards literature", Bharatiya Jnanpith anunced on Friday, December 14.

"Amitav Ghosh is a path-breaking velist. In his vels, Ghosh tres through historical settings to modern era and weaves a where past connects with present in relevant ways. 

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"His fiction is endowed with extraordinary depth and substance through his acemic training as a historian and a social anthropologist," a statement from Bharatiya Jnanpith re. 

decision was taken in a meeting of Jnanpith Selection Board chaired by eminent velist, scholar and Jnanpith laureate Pratibha Ray.

Ghosh, one of most prominent contemporary Indian writers, is kwn for a series of vels such as "Show Lines", " Glass Palace", " Hungry Tide", and Ibis Trilogy -- "Sea of Poppies", "River of Smoke", and "Flood of Fire" -- chronicling Opium tre between India and China run by East India Company.

writer, in a tweet, said he was "hored and humbled".  In ar tweet responding to a fan, he said, "this is an amazing day for me. I never thought I would find myself on this list, with some of writers I most mire."

Born in Kolkata in 1956 to a Bengali Hindu family, 62-year-old author currently lives in New York with his wife Deborah Baker. Ghosh, who spent his formative years in India, Banglesh, and Sri Lanka, studied in Delhi, Oxford and Alexandria.

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His most recent book, " Great Derangement; Climate Change and Unthinkable, a work of n-fiction", was released in 2016. Ghosh is also recipient of Pma Shri and Sahitya Akemi Award.

Some of biggest Indian writers have been awarded this prestigious literary recognition. Major names among 58 recipients include literary icons Krishna Sobti, Kedarnath Singh, Shrilal Shukla, Nirmal Verma, Girish Karn, Mahasweta Devi, Amrita Pritam, and U R Ananthamurthy