Banu Mushtaq

Banu Mushtaq
Born (1948-04-03) 3 April 1948
Hassan, Mysore State, Dominion of India
(now Hassan, Karnataka, India)
OccupationWriter, activist and lawyer
Notable worksHeart Lamp (translated by Deepa Bhasthi)
Notable awardsInternational Booker Prize (2025)

Banu Mushtaq (born 3 April 1948) is an Indian Kannada-language writer, activist, and lawyer from Karnataka. She is best known for Heart Lamp, a selection of her short stories translated by Deepa Bhasthi, which won the International Booker Prize in 2025. She has published six short story collections, a novel, an essay collection, and a poetry collection. Her work has been translated into Urdu, Hindi, Tamil, Malayalam, and English.