Anjali Deshpande
About the Author
Anjali Deshpande, born 1954, attended Zakir Husain College in Delhi and studied philosophy at Delhi University. She was active in the student and women's movements and has taken part in numerous campaigns to improve the situation of Dalits and other groups on the margins of caste society. She describes herself as a follower of the great politician and social reformer "Babasaheb" Ambedkar. In the late 1970s Anjali Deshpande was involved in political street theatre, wrote plays on current topics and performed in them herself. Very popular, among others, was her play about the Asian Games, Safed Appu.
As a journalist she wrote a weekly column on women from 1981 to 1984 in the magazine Mainstream, edited by Nikhil Chakravarty. She worked for the English-language India Press Agency, also founded by N. Chakravarty, as well as for the Hindi-language news agency Samvad, and at times also for the political magazine Probe India at Mitra Prakashan and for the Sunday Observer. She published critical articles on, among other things, bonded labour in Rajasthan and on media coverage after the 2008 Mumbai terrorist attack. She has also worked as an editor and translator.
She now works primarily as a freelance author in Hindi and English. She has published short stories in the Hindi magazines Hans, Kathadesh, Rachna Samay, Drishyantar, Pakhi and Jansatta. A selection of her stories was published in 2019 under the title Ansari ki maut ki ajib dastan. In 2012 her first novel, Impeachment, was published in English, dealing with the struggle for justice for the victims of the Bhopal gas disaster; a reworked version was later published in Hindi under the title Mahabhiyog. The novel Hatya was highly praised by critics; it is the only work available in German.
Almuth Degener
Important Works
- Impeachment, novel, Delhi: Hachette 2012
- Mahābhiyog, novel (the Hindi version of Impeachment), Delhi: Rajkamal Prakashan 2016
- Ansari kī maut kī ajīb dāstān, stories, Delhi: Setu Prakashan 2019
- Hatyā, novel, Delhi: Rajpal 2019
- With Nandita Haksar: Japanese Management, Indian Resistance: The Struggles of the Maruti Suzuki Workers. Delhi: Speaking Tiger 2023
Published in German
- Mord, novel, translated from Hindi by Almuth Degener. Heidelberg: Draupadi 2023
Reading Excerpt
Web Links
- Review of "Impeachment" in The Hindu, 12.09.2012
- Review of "Impeachment" in kafila.online, 29.07.2012
- Report on Bonded Labour in Rajasthan (PDF)
Reviews of Mord
- Sonja Hartl in SWR Kultur, 14.9.2023 (in German)
- Claudia Schulmerich at Weltexpresso.de, 28.07.2023 (in German)
- Maria Wiesner in the FAZ, 03.09.2023 (in German)
- Carola Torti in Der Freitag, 18.11.2023 (in German)
- André Dahlmeyer in Junge Welt, 26.09.2024 (in German)
Further Links
📄 Download this author portrait as PDF (in German)