Smt. Prativa Roy is the New Chairperson of Bharatiya Jnanpith Selection Board.

Bhubaneswar:7/10/18:Known for her fight against caste and religious discrimination, Pratibha Ray, who won prestigious Jnanpith Award in 2011, being  assumed as  the New Chairperson of Bharatiya Jnanpith Selection Board.Pratibha Ray  was the first Odia woman and fourth Odia writer to get the Jnanpith Award,Earlier Gopinath Mohanty (1973), Sachidananda Routray (1986) and Sitakant Mohapatra (1993) were conferred the honour.Pratibha Ray was born to a Gandhian teacher on January 21, 1943, at Alabol village. Her Vaishnavite family preached no caste and no class, which was later exhibited in her efforts towards social reform and against social injustice in her novels and other writings.

Ray courted controversy after writing a newspaper article titled “The Colour of Religion is black” (Dharmara Ranga Kala) in which she spoke of the undesirable behaviour of priests.This was apparently based on an encounter with priests of the Sri Jagannth Temple, which she visited with some women from outside Odisha and when the priests suspected that her companions were non-Hindus.
Ray, also a mother of three, became a model for her writer fraternity when she wore the attire of the Bonda women while writing a book (Adi Bhumi) on the particularly vulnerable tribal community in the eastern Indian state.

Though Ray’s literary journey started at nine, she received recognition as a writer with her first novel “Barsa Basanta Baishakha” in 1974 followed by “Aranya”, 1977, “Nishidha Prithivi”, 1978, “Parichya”, 1979, “Aparichita”, 1979 (a film was made and won Best Film-Story award from the state government), Punyatoya, 1979, Meghamedura, 1980, Ashabari, 1980, Ayamarambha, 1981, Nilatrishna, 1981, Samudrara Swara, 1982.

Ray’s Shilapadma in 1983 won her the Orissa Sahitya Academy Award, 1985, while Yajnaseni (1984) got her the Moorti Devi Award in 1991 and Sarala Award in 1990.

Jnanpith Award is an Indian literary award presented annually by the Bharatiya Jnanpith to an author for their “outstanding contribution towards literature”. Instituted in 1961, the award is bestowed only on Indian writers writing in Indian languages included in the Eighth Schedule to the Constitution of India and English, with no posthumous conferral.

From 1965 till 1981, the award was given to the authors for their “most outstanding work” and consisted of a citation plaque, a cash prize of ₹1 lakh (equivalent to ₹48 lakh or US$66,000 in 2017), and a bronze replica of Saraswati, the Hindu goddess of knowledge and wisdom. The first recipient of the award was the Malayalam writer G. Sankara Kurup who received the award in 1965 for his collection of poems, Odakkuzhal (The Bamboo Flute), published in 1950.^] The rules were revised in subsequent years to consider only works published during the preceding twenty years, excluding the year for which the award was to be given and the cash prize was increased to ₹1.5 lakh (equivalent to ₹22 lakh or US$30,000 in 2017) from 1981.

As of 2015, the cash prize has been revised to ₹11 lakh (equivalent to ₹12 lakh or US$16,000 in 2017) and out of twenty-three eligible languages the award has been presented for works in fifteen languages: Hindi (eleven), Kannada (eight), Bengali (six), Malayalam (five), Gujarati, Marathi, Odia, and Urdu (four each), Telugu (three), Assamese, Punjabi, and Tamil (two each), Kashmiri, Konkani, and Sanskrit (one each). The award has been conferred upon fifty-seven writers including seven women authors. In 1976, Bengali novelist Ashapoorna Devi became the first woman to win the award and was honoured for the 1965 novel Pratham Pratisruti (The First Promise), the first in a trilogy. The most recent recipient of the award is Hindi fiction writer and essayist Krishna Sobti who was awarded for the year 2017.

Jnanpith Award is an Indian literary award presented annually by the Bharatiya Jnanpith to an author for their “outstanding contribution towards literature”. Instituted in 1961, the award is bestowed only on Indian writers writing in Indian languages included in the Eighth Schedule to the Constitution of India and English, with no posthumous conferral.

From 1965 till 1981, the award was given to the authors for their “most outstanding work” and consisted of a citation plaque, a cash prize of ₹1 lakh (equivalent to ₹48 lakh or US$66,000 in 2017), and a bronze replica of Saraswati, the Hindu goddess of knowledge and wisdom. The first recipient of the award was the Malayalam writer G. Sankara Kurup who received the award in 1965 for his collection of poems, Odakkuzhal (The Bamboo Flute), published in 1950.^] The rules were revised in subsequent years to consider only works published during the preceding twenty years, excluding the year for which the award was to be given and the cash prize was increased to ₹1.5 lakh (equivalent to ₹22 lakh or US$30,000 in 2017) from 1981.

As of 2015, the cash prize has been revised to ₹11 lakh (equivalent to ₹12 lakh or US$16,000 in 2017) and out of twenty-three eligible languages the award has been presented for works in fifteen languages: Hindi (eleven), Kannada (eight), Bengali (six), Malayalam (five), Gujarati, Marathi, Odia, and Urdu (four each), Telugu (three), Assamese, Punjabi, and Tamil (two each), Kashmiri, Konkani, and Sanskrit (one each). The award has been conferred upon fifty-seven writers including seven women authors. In 1976, Bengali novelist Ashapoorna Devi became the first woman to win the award and was honoured for the 1965 novel Pratham Pratisruti (The First Promise), the first in a trilogy. The most recent recipient of the award is Hindi fiction writer and essayist Krishna Sobti who was awarded for the year 2017.