Dr Rajkumar’s iconic Kannada song quoted at Booker Prize ceremony. Watch

In a historic moment, Heart Lamp, a short story collection by Banu Mushtaq, became the first Kannada title to win the prestigious Booker Prize.

At a glittering ceremony held at London’s Tate Modern on Tuesday night, translator Deepa Bhasthi shared the spotlight with author Banu Mushtaq as their work Hridaya Deepa (Heart Lamp) made history by becoming the first-ever Kannada title to win the prestigious £50,000 International Booker Prize.

Deepa Bhasthi at Booker Prize ceremony.(X)

In an emotional acceptance speech, Bhasthi paid tribute to the Kannada language by quoting an iconic line from a Kannada song. "Jenin holeyo, halin maleyo, sudheyo, Kannada savi nudio," which likens Kannada to a river of honey, a rain of milk, and sweet ambrosia.

Watch her speech here:

The song, penned by lyricist C. Udayashankar and immortalised in the voice of Kannada cinema legend Dr. Rajkumar, is widely celebrated for its poetic reverence of the language.

“What a win this is for my beautiful language,” Bhasthi said, drawing loud applause. “Kannada is one of the oldest languages on earth, and I am ecstatic that this will hopefully lead to a greater interest in reading, writing, and translating from and into the language.”

More about ‘Heart Lamp’

The award-winning collection, consisting of 12 short stories, paints a compelling picture of women's resilience, resistance, humour, and solidarity within patriarchal communities in southern India. Rooted in the region’s rich oral storytelling traditions, the stories span more than three decades, written between 1990 and 2023.

Judges praised the work for its “witty, vivid, colloquial, moving and excoriating” tone, noting how it sensitively captured the intricacies of family relationships and community conflicts. The collection emerged as a standout among six shortlisted titles from across the globe.

“This book was born from the belief that no story is ever small, that in the tapestry of human experience every thread holds the weight of the whole,” Banu Mushtaq said during her acceptance speech. “In a world that often tries to divide us, literature remains one of the last sacred spaces where we can live inside each other’s minds, if only for a few pages.”