Winners of 2022 Gayatri Memorial Awards for Literary Excellence Ananda Mandir has announced the winners of the 2022 Gayatri Memorial Awards. The co-winners in the Bengali nominations category are Shamita Das Dasgupta (Montville, NJ) and Sudipta Bhawmik (Bridgewater, NJ). The winner in the English nominations category is Ranjana Sanyal (Bridgewater, NJ). Each winner will receive a cash award of $500 and a plaque with an appropriate citation. Congratulations to all the winners!
Shamita Das Dasgupta A retired professor, Shamita is an established writer and an active social worker, specializing on the betterment of marginalized and abused women in society. She is one of the co-founders of Manavi, a NJ-based non-profit organization serving the victims of domestic abuse within the South Asian communities. She has authored five books in English (four were published in America and one in India) and one mystery novel and two collections of mystery stories in Bengali. She has also published three translations of English books and authored two books of her own poems.
Sudipta Bhawmik Sudipta Bhawmik is an acclaimed playwright, director and actor. He has published four volumes of plays, and he leads ECTA, a NJ-based theatrical group that is well-known to theater lovers in America, India and many other countries. Since many of his plays deal with the lives and struggles of Bengali immigrants in America, they have found warm reception from the Indian diaspora in many countries. His works have been translated into several languages (such as Hindi, English, Marathi, Tamil, etc.), incorporated in the syllabus of several American universities and have been the subject of research studies. Sudipta’s plays have been staged not only in many states America but also in many parts of the world. Recipient of numerous awards and honors in drama circles, his serialized podcast, “The Stories of Mahabharata”, has received special recognition from Apple iTunes for its extraordinary popularity around the globe.
Ranjana Sanyal The daughter of an Indian Army Medical Corps Colonel, Ranjana Sanyal was born in Calcutta and grew up in various Army bases all over India. She received her MA in Political Science from Presidency College, Calcutta, and then globe-trotted with her husband for a few years before immigrating to the USA in 1997. Ranjana has served the disabled adult population of NJ for over a decade, and currently works for the Office of Program Integrity and Accountability in NJ’s Department of Human Services. She has had a varied earlier career in market research, medical administration and school-teaching. Ranjana is active in several religious, cultural and charitable organizations in the Bengali Immigrant community. Ranjana lists art, music and literature among her passions and raising her two children as her biggest blessings.