Keki 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. He is also a former Indian Police Service officer. 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. He was awarded Padma Shri, the fourth highest civilian award in India, in 2014.
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.
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
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.
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 edited by Menka Shivdasani, The Dance of the Peacock.
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 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. 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." 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.
...
Wikipedia