Banu Mushtaq is a writer, activist and lawyer in the state of Karnataka, southern India. Mushtaq began writing within the progressive protest literary circles in southwestern India in the 1970s and 1980s: critical of the caste and class system, the Bandaya Sahitya movement gave rise to influential Dalit and Muslim writers, of whom Mushtaq was one of the fewwomen. She is the author of six short story collections, a novel, an essay collection and a poetry collection. She writes in Kannada and has won major awards for her literary works, including the Karnataka Sahitya Academy and the Daana Chintamani Attimabbe awards. Previously translated into Urdu, Hindi, Tamil and Malayalam, the first book-length translation of her work into English is Heart Lamp: Selected Stories, which has been shortlisted for the 2025 International Booker Prize. 'Red Lungi', a story from Heart Lamp, has been published in the Paris Review.
Deepa Bhasthi is a writer and literary translator based in Kodagu, southern India. She translates from Kannada and also publishes essays and cultural criticism.
