Booker and bharat: From Banu Mushtaq to Anrundhati Roy, Indian authors who won International Booker Prize

Awarded the Booker Prize for her book 'Heart Lamp' in 2025, Banu Mushtaq has been an articulate voice for women's lives, caste, power dynamics, and oppression. She is also the first Kannada author to win the award. (Image: AP)

Translated into more than 40 languages across the globe, Arundhati Roy won the Booker Prize for her novel 'The God of Small Things' in 1997. Through this book Rooy weaved a moving story of love and death seen through the eyes of twin 7 year-olds. (Image: X/@royarundhti)

Noted to be the author of the first Hindi language novel to win the Booker Prize, Geetanjali Shree won the prestigious award in 2022 for her novel 'Ret Samadhi' (Tomb of Sand). The book revolves around the story of an 80-year-old woman who tackles depression and finds new purpose in life post her husband's death. (Image: AP)

Known for his controversial books, Salman Rushdie bagged the Booker Prize in the year 1981 for his book 'Midnight's Children'. The book also won the Booker of Bookers in 1993 and the Best of the Booker in 2008. (Image: AP)

Kiran Desai won the Booker Prize for her book 'The Inheritance of Loss' in the year 2006. At 35, Desai became the youngest woman to win the award. She is the daughter of the much-celebrated Anita Desai and was born in Delhi. (Image: AP)

V S Naipaul won the Booker Prize in 1971 for his novel 'In a Free State'. The book followed themes of alienation, racial tension, and disruption. He was the first Indian-origin novelist to win the Booker Prize in the fiction category.

The Booker winner of 2008, for his book The White Tiger Aravind Adiga began his career as a financial journalist. The White Tiger sold more than 200,000 copies, and it was also made into a movie in 2021 starring Priyanka Chopra, Rajkumar Rao, and Adarsh in 2021.