Kolkata: Eminent Bengali author and social activist Mahasweta Devi, who was the champion of the marginalised and the voice of the oppressed, died in Kolkata today after a brief illness. She was 90.
The author had been keeping ill for some months now and was recently admitted in hospital.
Mahasweta Devi had won many awards, among which the most prominent are the Sahitya Akademi Award, the Gnanpith and the Ramon Magsaysay awards. She was conferred the Padma Shri in 1986 and the Padma Vibhushan in 2006.
Read: Mahasweta Devi's autobiography remains unfinished, lost after her demise
Prime Minister Narendra Modi condoled her death. "Mahashweta Devi wonderfully illustrated the might of the pen. A voice of compassion, equality & justice, she leaves us deeply saddened," Modi tweeted.
Mahashweta Devi wonderfully illustrated the might of the pen. A voice of compassion, equality & justice, she leaves us deeply saddened. RIP.
— Narendra Modi (@narendramodi) July 28, 2016
West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee also offered tribute to the writer on the micro-blogging site.
"India has lost a great writer. Bengal has lost a glorious mother. I have lost a personal guide. Mahashweta Di rest in peace," she said.
India has lost a great writer. Bengal has lost a glorious mother. I have lost a personal guide. Mahashweta Di rest in peace
— Mamata Banerjee (@MamataOfficial) July 28, 2016
Mahasweta Devi was born in 1926 in a family of writers. Her father Manish Ghatak – the elder brother of renowned film director Ritwik Ghatak – was a well-known poet and novelist. Her mother was Dharitri Devi, also a writer and social worker.
Mahasweta schooled in Dhaka before joining Rabindranath Tagore’s Vishvabharati University in Santiniketan, West Bengal to graduate in English Literature. She had a Master’s degree in the subject from Calcutta University.
She married playwright Bijon Bhattacharya, one of the founding members of theatre’s IPTA movement. She was divorced from Bhattacharya in 1959. The couple’s son is Nabarun Bhattacharya, a leading light in Bengal’s literary family.
Mahasweta Devi has been a teacher, journalist and creative writer. A litterateur with the zeal of an activist, Mahasweta Devi used creative expression as a tool to fight for the rights of the indigenous people and marginalised sections.
She has been lauded for her many social initiatives – working with and studying Bengal’s tribals, the lodhas and shabars, also those of Bihar, Madhya Pradesh and Chhattisgarh.
Going beyond her role as a writer and journalist, Devi also helped tribals and the rural dispossessed in organising themselves in groups so that they could take up development activities in their own areas. She founded several grassroots societies for the welfare of tribals.
She was the voice of the oppressed, her creative work replete with their lives, their fears and their hopes.
Mahasweta Devi has also been a stringent critic of West Bengal’s industrial policy, espousing the rights of farmers to their fertile land.
Several of her works have been made into critically-acclaimed cinema. Govind Nihalani's 1998 Hindi film 'Hazaar Chaurasi ki Ma' (The Mother of 1,084) is based on her novel on the emotional struggle of a mother who tries to understand the reasons behind her son's involvement in the Naxalite movement.
In 1993, Kalpana Lajmi made the award-winning 'Rudaali' on her novel by the same name, chronicling the life of professional mourners on the death of upper-caste men in Rajasthan.
Italian director Italo Spinelli also made the multi-lingual 'Gangor' based on her short story 'Choli Ke Peeche' about the rights of women.
