PVLF 2025

JCB Prize for Literature Ends, Shocking Literary Community

The JCB Prize for Literature, India’s most lucrative literary award, shuts down after 7 years, leaving authors and publishers shocked and disappointed.
on Jul 25, 2025

JCB Prize for Literature Shuts Down, Sends Shockwaves Among India's Literary Set

It's the last word for the JCB Prize for Literature, widely considered India's most coveted literary award. It stopped after seven years of existence. The first hint of this news went out on June 12 through a social media post by book blogger Keetabi Keeda and later confirmed by the prize's literary director Mita Kapur on June 21.

The award has been closed. I am not going to deny something obvious. But for everything else, no comment," Kapur said in media reports, without providing further explanation.

In 2018, the JCB Literature Foundation initiated the award with the goal of encouraging new Indian writing and translations into English of works originally written in regional languages. Every year, the prize gave ₹25 lakh to the author and ₹10 lakh to the translator (where relevant), making it the most lucrative literary award in India.

In its height, the prize's shut-down occurred without a public formal announcement. No call for submission for the 2025 award was made, and a discreet ceremony accompanied the 2024 award ceremony—the latter taking place at JCB India's corporate office in Faridabad, a far cry from the splurge celebrations of previous years.

Adding to the confusion, a March 12 document was posted on the official website of the prize, saying that the JCB Literature Foundation had requested to cancel its Section 8 company license. The notice said that the foundation would be converted into a private limited company, effectively terminating its non-profit status.

Controversy and Criticism

The move comes after months of outcry over the parent company, JCB India, whose bulldozers have been used in demolition drives by multiple state governments – including Uttar Pradesh, Assam, Delhi-NCR, and Jammu & Kashmir. Some of the demolitions were condemned as punitive measures against a particular community.

In 2024, over 120 writers, translators, poets, and publishers signed an open letter expressing concern over the prize's indirect association with these actions. The JCB Literature Foundation did not respond publicly to the letter.

A Short But Impactful Run

The JCB Prize was a big hit in India's literary landscape, more so with encouraging regional language literature via translation. Of the seven winners from 2018–2024, five were translations—four Malayalam and one Tamil.

List of JCB Prize Winners (2018–2024):

2018: Jasmine Days by Benyamin (Malayalam; translated by Shahnaz Habib)

2019: The Far Field by Madhuri Vijay

2020: Moustache by S. Hareesh (Malayalam; translated by Jayasree Kalathil)

2021: Delhi: A Soliloquy by M. Mukundan (Malayalam; translated by Fathima EV and Nandakumar K)

2022: The Paradise of Food by Khalid Jawed (Urdu; translated by Baran Farooqi)

2023: Fire Bird by Perumal Murugan (Tamil; translated by Janaki Kannan)

2024: Lorenzo Searches for the Meaning of Life by Upamanyu Chatterjee

Widespread Reactions

The literary community has expressed disappointment over the abrupt end of the prize.

Poet and Kerala Literature Festival director K. Satchidanandan said, “I am extremely sad about its closure. It was not just an award but major encouragement for translations from regional literature. Such recognition is essential for cultural exchange and national integration.”

Ravi Deecee, CEO of DC Books, a three-time JCB Prize-winning publisher, has described the decision as "deeply disheartening," going on to say that the prize encouraged publishers to experiment with voices from the regions. "It wasn't merely a reward for merit—it legitimized stories based in local imaginations and cultures," he said.

Prolific writer and erstwhile jury member Jerry Pinto said, "All prizes are a way of society telling fiction writers that they are doing well. I hope another institution picks up the baton that JCB has let drop."

So far, JCB India hasn't released a public statement regarding the reasons for the prize's shutdown or if it is a temporary halt. The literary community waits for clarification, even while pondering the space left behind by the abrupt vanishing of a prize that managed to change Indian literature in a brief period of time.