Keki N. Daruwalla

Keki N. Daruwalla
Born 1937
Lahore, British India
Occupation poet, writer
Language English
Nationality Indian
Ethnicity Parsi
Period 1957–present
Notable awards Sahitya Akademi Award (1984)

Keki N. Daruwalla (born 1937) is a major Indian poet and short story writer in English language. He has written over 12 books and published his first novel For Pepper and Christ in 2009.[1][2] He is also a former Indian Police Service officer, who retired as Additional Director in the Research and Analysis Wing (RAW).[3]

He was awarded the Sahitya Akademi Award, in 1984 for his poetry collection, The Keeper of the Dead, by the Sahitya Akademi, India's National Academy of Letters.[4] He was awarded Padma Shri, the fourth highest civilian award in India, in 2014.[5]

Early life and education

Keki Nasserwanji Daruwalla was born in Lahore in 1937. His father N.C. Daruwalla, was an eminent professor, who taught in Government College Lahore. Before the Partition of India, his family left undevided India in 1945 and moved to Junagarh and then to Rampur in India. As a result, he grew up studying in various schools and in various languages.[6]

He obtained his master's degree in English Literature from Government College, Ludhiana, University of Punjab. He spent a year at oxford as a Queen Elizabeth House Fellow in 1980-81

Career

He joined the Indian Police Service (IPS) in 1958, and eventually becoming a Special Assistant to the Prime Minister on International Affairs. He subsequently was in the Cabinet Secretariat until his retirement.[1]

His first book of poetry was Under Orion, which was published by Writers Workshop, India in 1970. He then went on to publish his second collection Apparition in April in 1971 for which he was given the Uttar Pradesh State Award in 1972.His poems appeared in many prestigious poetry anthologies like Anthology of Contemporary Indian Poetry [7]edited by Menka Shivdasani, The Dance of the Peacock.[8][9]

He won the Sahitya Akademi Award, given by the Sahitya Akademi, India's National Academy of Letters, in 1984 and returned the same award in October, 2015 in protest and with a statement[10] that "The organisation Sahitya Akademi has failed to speak out against ideological collectives that have used physical violence against authors". Daruwalla did not take back his award even after Sahitya Akademi passed a resolution condemning the attacks on rational thinkers.[11] In an interview to The Statesman, Daruwalla expanded on why he did not take back his award, saying "what you do, you do once and you can’t be seen as giving back an award and then taking it back."[12] He received Commonwealth Poetry Prize for Asia in 1987. Nissim Ezekiel comments "Daruwalla has the energy of the lion". He is president of The Poetry Society (India), and is based in Delhi.

Books

J. P. Dutta's Bollywood film Refugee is attributed to have been inspired by the story by Keki N. Daruwalla based around the Great Rann of Kutch titled "LOVE ACROSS THE SALT DESERT"[14] which is also included as one of the short stories in the School Standard XII syllabus English textbook of NCERT in India.[15]

Further reading

Online poetry

See also

References

  1. 1 2 Keki N. Daruwalla The South Asian Literary Recordings Project. Library of Congress.
  2. ↑ "A long story". The Indian Express. 12 May 2009.
  3. ↑ "The cell is headed by Keki Daruwalla, an IPS officer..". The Indian Express. 8 July 1998.
  4. ↑ "Sahitya Akademi Award – English (Official listings)". Sahitya Akademi.
  5. ↑ "Padma Awards Announced". Press Information Bureau, Ministry of Home Affairs, Government of India. 25 January 2014. Archived from the original on 8 February 2014. Retrieved 26 January 2014.
  6. ↑ "Mapping memories". The Hindu. 4 June 2003.
  7. ↑ "Anthology of Contemporary Indian Poetry". BigBridge.Org. Retrieved 9 June 2016.
  8. ↑ Grove, Richard. "The Dance of the Peacock:An Anthology of English Poetry from India" (current). Hidden Brook Press, Canada. Retrieved 5 January 2015.
  9. ↑ Press, Hidden Brook. "Hidden Brook Press". Hidden Brook Press. Retrieved 5 January 2015.
  10. ↑ "Daruwalla returns his award". http://scroll.in. Scroll. 14 October 2015. External link in |publisher= (help)
  11. ↑ "The Statesman: After 54 days, Sahitya Akademi breaks silence". thestatesman.com. Retrieved 24 November 2015.
  12. ↑ Suman, Saket. "'We can only throw back our awards'". Retrieved 24 November 2015.
  13. ↑ "A third collection with variety". The Indian Express. 11 May 2003.
  14. ↑ LOVE ACROSS THE SALT DESERT; by Keki N. Daruwalla. Pdf of full story posted at Boston University at . Bollywood connection – J. P. Dutta's "Refugee" is said to be inspired by this story; learnhub, University of Dundee
  15. ↑ (iii) Supplementary Reader; Selected Pieces of General English for Class XII; English General – Class XII; Curriculum and Syllabus for Classes XI & XII; NCERT. Also posted at / Archived 2 September 2009 at the Wayback Machine.,
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