Booker Prize 2025: Collection of short stories about Muslim women in south India finds place in longlist

International Booker Prize 2025 longlist celebrates Kannada writer Banu Mushtaq and translator Deepa Bhasthi’s joint effort in a collection of short stories about Muslim women in south India

Kannada writer Banu Mushtaq’s collection of short stories Heart Lamp (Penguin Random House India), translated into English by Deepa Bhasthi, has made it to the longlist for the International Booker Prize 2025. The shortlist of six books will be announced on April 8, while the winner will be revealed in London on May 20. In response to the news, Mushtaq shares, “I am extremely happy that a translation of my stories is on the International Booker Prize longlist. It is a tremendous honour for literature in the Kannada language.”

It is the first book in Kannada to have been nominated for the prestigious award. Hassan-based Mushtaq has stood against oppression as an activist, a lawyer, a reporter, and a storyteller. The stories in the collection, written between 1990 and 2023, explore the lives of Muslim women in southern India. Whether transgressive in their thinking, cunning in their actions, exploitative towards their own kind, assertive in asking for their rights, or tender towards their loved ones, women become key drivers of the narratives.

Banu Mushtaq and Deepa Bhasthi

“That the everyday experiences of South Indian women building lives under patriarchal pressures have resonated with the distinguished jury, and hopefully, will soon reach a global readership, is both humbling and affirming. It is a testament to the universality of Banu Mushtaq’s stories and to the power of translation,” Bhasthi, the translator, tells us.

Here are five of our recommendations from the collection:

1. Stone Slabs for Shaista Mahal: The narrative looks at the lives of two women, Shaista and Zeenat, as well as Shaista’s oldest daughter Asifa. Shaista argues how she wouldn’t want her daughter to fall prey to a fate similar to hers. Themes of masculinity, misplaced love, and girls’ education being cut short by the burdens of domesticity become important ideas in the story.

2. Soft Whispers: When Abid, a friend from the past, emerges during the Urs Festival, a memory resurfaces for the protagonist. She remembers a birthday with Ajjijaan’s dress for her, Abid’s simultaneous consolation and tricks, and Ajjijaan’s succour. She searches for her “naughty, uncivilised” friend in Abid, but finds a different man, now a mujawar (supervisor) in her family’s dargah.

3. A Taste of Heaven: Bi Dadi, an old woman in the house, constantly bickers with her nephew’s wife, Shameem Banu. One day, when she finds her ja-namaz (prayer mat) desecrated in grease stains, she breaks down in tears. When the grandkids offer her Pepsi, Bi Dadi is transported to heaven. Peace is restored in the house as long as there is soda for Bi Dadi.  

4. Red Lungi: When Latif Ahmad and his wife Razia find out that the children in the family would be spending their summer with them, they decide to lighten their burden by getting ‘khatna’ (circumcision) done for the boys. On discovering the excess cloth roll for the lungis, they offer free service to an army of kids who can’t afford it, stitching up less decorative lungis for them. Things take a turn; Razia’s children writhe in pain.   

5. The Shroud: Shaziya remembers to bring expensive gifts for her relatives, but forgets poor, hardworking Yaseen Bua’s wish for a kafan (shroud) from Hajj. When bua asks her about it, Shaziya belittles her. When Yaseen Bua passes away and her son visits Shaziya to fulfil his mother’s last wish, guilt eats her up.

Available At leading bookstores and e-stores
Cost: Rs 399

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