Kamleshwar (writer)

Indian writer and screenwriter

Kamleshwar

Born| Kamleshwar Prasad Saxena
(1932-01-06)6 January 1932
Mainpuri, United Provinces, British India
Died| 27 January 2007(2007-01-27) (aged 75)
Faridabad, Haryana, India
Pen name| Kamleshwar
Occupation| Writer, screenwriter and critic
Alma mater| Allahabad University
Period| 1954–2006
Genre| Novel, short story, essay, screenplay
Literary movement| Nayi Kahani
Notable works| Kitne Pakistan (2000)
Notable awards| Sahitya Akademi Award (2003)
Padma Bhushan (2005)

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Literature portal

Kamleshwar Prasad Saxena (6 January 1932 – 27 January 2007), known mononymously as Kamleshwar, was a 20th-century Indian writer who wrote in Hindi. He also worked as a screenwriter for Indian films and television industry. Among his most well-known works are the films Aandhi, Mausam, Chhoti Si Baat and Rang Birangi. He was awarded the 2003 Sahitya Akademi Award for his Hindi novel Kitne Pakistan (translated in English as Partitions), and the Padma Bhushan in 2005.[1]

He is considered a part of the league of Hindi writers like Mohan Rakesh, Nirmal Verma, Rajendra Yadav and Bhisham Sahni, who left the old pre-independence literary preoccupations and presented the new sensibilities that reflected new moorings of a post-independence India, thus launching the Hindi literature's Nayi Kahani ("New Story") movement in the 1950s.[2]

## Biography[edit]

### Early life and education[edit]

Kamleshwar Prasad Saxena[3] was born in the Mainpuri district[4] of Uttar Pradesh, India, where he spent his early years. Kamleshwar's first story, "Comrade", was published in 1948.[5]

Later he did his graduation and followed by a master's degree in Hindi literature from Allahabad University. His first novel, Badnam Gali (Cursed Lane), was published while he was still a student;[5] he later started his literary career in Allahabad itself.

## Career[edit]

In his early days, he worked as a proofreader,[5] growing up to become, the editor of 'Vihan', literary magazine in the late 1950s. This was followed by editorship of many Hindi magazines, like 'Nayi Kahaniyan' (1963–66), 'Sarika' (1967–78), 'Katha Yatra' (1978–79), 'Ganga' (1984–88) and weeklies, 'lngit' (1961–63) and 'Shree Varsha' (1979–80), besides this, he also remained the editor of Hindi dailies, 'Dainik Jagaran' (1990–1992), and 'Dainik Bhaskar' (1996–2002),[4] and helped revive the Hindi magazine, 'Sarika', as its editor by bringing focus on new and emerging voices of modern India, an effort which reflected his encouragement to Marathi Dalit writers and Bohra Muslim litterateurs, thus opening new vistas for Hindi readers.

> ...once upon a time, trees provided shelter from the sun and the wind to human homes. Now, the trees have become used to growing in the shadows of tall concrete buildings.

> — Kamleshwar, Kitne Pakistan

Kamleshwar became famous for his short stories, and some other works, which depicted the contemporary life in a vivid style of presentation. With the publication of his story, 'Raja Nirbansiya' (1957),[6] he was immediately placed in league of leading writers of his times. In his prolific career, spanning four decades, he wrote over three hundred stories, including, "Maans Ka Dariya", "Neeli Jheel" and "Kasbe Ka Aadmi",[7] published over ten collections of short stories, ten novels most prominent among them being, Ek Sadak Sattawan Galiyan, Laute Huye Musafir, Kaali Aandhi, Aagami Ateet, Registan and Kitne Pakistan, apart from 35 other literary works in different genres ranging from literary criticism, travelogue, memoirs, to socio-cultural commentary.

### Films[edit]

He moved to Bombay in the 1970s and started writing scripts and dialogues for Hindi films, in the next decade or so, he worked for over 75 feature films, which include films like Gulzar's Aandhi, based on his novel Kaali Aandhi, Mausam; Basu Chatterjee, Chhoti Si Baat, Rang Birangi and Ravi Chopra's thriller, The Burning Train. In fact, reminiscing his works noted poet-director, Gulzar said that "in 'Kitne Pakistan'... there is a description where a handkerchief falls off the bridge; I always used to tell him that I could write a complete short story on this one line only.".[8] He won the 1979 Filmfare Award for Best Screenplay for Pati Patni Aur Woh, directed by B. R. Chopra.[9]

### Television[edit]

By the late 1970s, he had made his first short TV film the "Jamuna Bazar", near river Yamuna in Delhi, and soon switched to television script-writing, and eventually became the 'Additional Director General' of Doordarshan, India's national television channel, (1980–82), during his tenure, in a matter of 24 months, the entire nation was connected with television network.[10]

Over the years, he wrote stories in ten TV serials including Chandrakanta, Aakash Ganga, Yug and Betal Pachisi, as well as popular serials based on literary works such as Darpan and Ek Kahani.[11] He hosted a popular talk show on Doordarshan, Parikrama, started a weekly literary show, Patrika, and also produced and directed several television programs and investigative documentaries on social and political issues for Doordarshan.[12]

### Later years[edit]

He was awarded the 2003 Sahitya Akademi Award for his novel based on the Partition of India in 1947, Kitne Pakistan (literally How Many Pakistans? but translated in English as Partitions), which explored the way nations fracture, through an allegorical court trial, wherein historical and political figures are present as witnesses,[13] and the Padma Bhushan in 2005.

He died on 27 January 2007 at Faridabad[14] following a heart attack, after being in poor health for several years.

A collection of his short stories in English translation, Not Flowers of Henna, was released in 2007.[15]

## Literary works[edit]

* Aagami Atit
* Aaj Ke Prasiddh Shayar Shaharyar
* Aazadi Mubarak
* Amma
* Anbita Vyatit
* Ankho Dekha Pakistan
* Atmakatha (3 Parts)
* Bayaan
* Bharatmata Gramvasini
* Chandrakanta ( Especially re-written by him for the popular TV serial)
* Dak Bangla
* Des-Pardes
* Ek Sarak Sattavan Galiyan
* George Pancham Ki Naak
* Gulmohar Phir Khilega

* Hindustan Hamara
* Hindustani Gazalein
* Jalti Hui Nadi (Part 3)
* Jinda Murde(kahani sangrah)
* Jo Maine Jiya (Part 1)
* Kahani Ki Teesri Duniya
* Kali Aandhi
* Kamleshwar Kee Shreshtha Kahaniyan
* Kasbe Ka Aadmi
* Kashmir Rat Ke Baad
* Katha Prasthan
* Khoyi Hui Dishayein
* Kitne Pakistan(novel)
* Kohra
* Maans Ka Dariya
* Mati Ho Gai Sona
* Mehfil

* Mere Hamsafar
* Meri Priya Kahaniyan
* Parikrama
* Pati Patni Aur Vah
* Raja Nirbansiya
* Registan
* Samagra Kahaniyan
* Samagra Upanyas (All of his 10 novels in one collection)
* Samudra Mein Khoya Aadmi
* Solah chaton wala ghar
* Subah Dopahar Sham
* Swatantryottar Hindi Kahaniyan
* Teesra Aadmi
* Tumhara Kamleshwar
* Vahi Baat
* Yadon Ke Chirag (Part 2)

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## Bibliography[edit]

* The Street with Fifty-Seven Lanes
* Not Flowers of Henna
* Kitne Pakistan, Rajpal & Sons, 2000. (Reprint: 2004, ISBN 81-7028-320-5)
* Partitions, Penguin Books, 2006. ISBN 0-14-400099-7 (Reprint: 2008, ISBN 978-0-14-306370-4; Presentation)
* "George Pancham ki Naak". NCERT.

## Filmography[edit]

* Sara Akash (1969) (dialogue)
* Badnam Basti (1971) (story)
* Aandhi (1975) (story)
* Mausam (1975) (story)
* Amanush (1975) (dialogue)[4]
* Chhoti Si Baat (1975) (dialogue & screenplay)
* Anand Ashram (1977) (dialogue)
* The Burning Train (1979) (dialogue & screenplay)
* Ram Balram (1980) (dialogue & screenplay)
* Saajan Ki Saheli (1981) (dialogue & screenplay)
* Souten (1983) (dialogue)
* Rang Birangi (1983) (story)
* Yeh Desh (1984) (dialogue)
* Laila (1984) (dialogue & screenplay)
* Preeti (1986) (dialogue & screenplay)
* Souten Ki Beti (1989) (dialogue)

## References[edit]

1. ^ "Padma Awards" (PDF). Ministry of Home Affairs, Government of India. 2015. Archived from the original (PDF) on 15 October 2015. Retrieved 21 July 2015.
2. ^ Kamleshwar.. The Times of India, 29 January 2007.
3. ^ Authors > Kamleshwar Authors at mapsofindia.
4. ^ a b c Kamleshwar Writer Profile at abhivyakti-hindi.
5. ^ a b c Kamleshwar brings out the truth of life The Tribune, 28 December 2003.
6. ^ Raja Narbansiya, Text in Devnagari script at abhivyakti-hindi.
7. ^ Kasbe Ka Aadmi Devnagari Text at abhivyakti-hindi.
8. ^ Kamleshwar, Hindi’s gem.. Archived 26 February 2008 at the Wayback Machine The Indian Express, 29 January 2007.
9. ^ "Best Screenplay Award". Filmfare Award Official Listings, Indiatimes. Archived from the original on 29 April 2014. Retrieved 28 April 2014.
10. ^ Kamaleshwar The Tribune, 28 January 2007.
11. ^ Indiaclub.com Collection Archived 11 May 2008 at the Wayback Machine Kamaleshwar Profile.
12. ^ Kamleshwar Profile Library of Congress, New Delhi Office.
13. ^ Sahitya Akademi Awards 1955–2005, Official listings Archived 13 May 2008 at the Wayback Machine 2003, Kitne Pakistan (Novel).
14. ^ Writer Kamleshwar.. musicmazaa, 29 January 2007.
15. ^ Katha Book Release The Hindu, 26 March 2007.

## External links[edit]

* Kamleshwar at IMDb
* A literary review of 'Kitne Pakistan', Partition
* English newspapers ignore literary giant's death

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Padma Bhushan award recipients (2000–2009)

2000|

* V. K. Aatre
* Anil Agarwal
* Ram Narain Agarwal
* Sharan Rani Backliwal
* Swami Kalyandev
* Veerendra Heggade
* Pavaguda V. Indiresan
* Wahiduddin Khan
* B. B. Lal
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2001|

* Dev Anand
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* Swadesh Chatterjee
* B. R. Chopra
* Ashok Desai
* K. M. George
* Bhupen Hazarika
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* Shiv K. Kumar
* Raghunath Mohapatra
* Arun Netravali
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* Abdul Karim Parekh
* Amrita Patel
* Pran
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* B. V. Raju
* P. Bhanumathi
* Sundaram Ramakrishnan
* Chitranjan Singh Ranawat
* Palle Rama Rao
* Raj Reddy
* Uma Sharma
* L. Subramaniam
* Naresh Trehan

2002|

* Gary Ackerman
* H. P. S. Ahluwalia
* Prabha Atre
* Sushantha Kumar Bhattacharyya
* Chandu Borde
* Eugene Chelyshev
* Pravinchandra Varjivan Gandhi
* Shobha Gurtu
* Henning Holck-Larsen
* Zakir Hussain
* B. K. S. Iyengar
* F. C. Kohli
* V. C. Kulandaiswamy
* Gury Marchuk
* Jagat Singh Mehta
* Ismail Merchant
* Mario Miranda
* Frank Pallone
* Ramanujam Varatharaja Perumal
* Natesan Rangabashyam
* Maharaja Krishna Rasgotra
* Habib Tanvir
* K. K. Venugopal
* Nirmal Verma
* K. J. Yesudas

2003|

* Teejan Bai
* Ammannur Madhava Chakyar
* Prabhu Chawla
* Herbert Fischer
* Jamshyd Godrej
* Coluthur Gopalan
* K. Parasaran
* B. Rajam Iyer
* Shri Krishna Joshi
* Madurai Narayanan Krishnan
* Rajinder Kumar
* Ramesh Kumar
* Purshotam Lal
* Sitakant Mahapatra
* Bagicha Singh Minhas
* Subhash Mukhopadhyay
* P. S. Narayanaswamy
* Arcot Ramachandran
* Trichur V. Ramachandran
* Kantilal Hastimal Sancheti
* T. V. Sankaranarayanan
* Naseeruddin Shah
* T. V. R. Shenoy
* Jagjit Singh
* Ram Badan Singh
* Hari Shankar Singhania
* Umayalpuram K. Sivaraman
* Narayanan Srinivasan
* Padma Subrahmanyam
* Swapna Sundari
* O. V. Vijayan
* Herbert Alexandrovich Yefremov

2004|

* Thoppil Varghese Antony
* Soumitra Chatterjee
* Chandrashekhar Shankar Dharmadhikari
* Gulzar
* Sardara Singh Johl
* M. V. Kamath
* Komal Kothari
* Yoshirō Mori
* Gopi Chand Narang
* Govindarajan Padmanaban
* Poornima Arvind Pakvasa
* Vishnu Prabhakar
* N. Rajam
* C. H. Hanumantha Rao
* Thiruvengadam Lakshman Sankar
* T. N. Seshagopalan
* Bijoy Nandan Shahi
* Krishna Srinivas
* Alarmel Valli

2005|

* Sardar Anjum
* André Beteille
* Chandi Prasad Bhatt
* Tumkur Ramaiya Satishchandran
* Mrinal Datta Chaudhuri
* Yash Chopra
* Manna Dey
* Irfan Habib
* Yusuf Hamied
* Qurratulain Hyder
* Tarlochan Singh Kler
* Anil Kohli
* Kiran Mazumdar-Shaw
* Mrinal Miri
* Hari Mohan
* Brijmohan Lall Munjal
* M. T. Vasudevan Nair
* Azim Premji
* Balraj Puri
* Syed Mir Qasim
* A. Ramachandran
* G. V. Iyer Ramakrishna
* V. S. Ramamurthy
* K. I. Varaprasad Reddy
* K. Srinath Reddy
* Girish Chandra Saxena
* Narasimaiah Seshagiri
* Mark Tully

2006|

* Jaiveer Agarwal
* P. S. Appu
* Shashi Bhushan
* Ganga Prasad Birla
* Grigory Bongard-Levin
* Lokesh Chandra
* Chiranjeevi
* Dinesh Nandini Dalmia
* Tarun Das
* Madhav Gadgil
* A. K. Hangal
* Devaki Jain
* Kamleshwar
* Abdul Halim Jaffer Khan
* Sabri Khan
* Ghulam Mustafa Khan
* Shanno Khurana
* Gunter Kruger
* P. Leela
* K. P. P. Nambiar
* Nandan Nilekani
* Sai Paranjpye
* Deepak Parekh
* M. V. Pylee
* Subramaniam Ramadorai
* N. S. Ramaswamy
* Pavani Parameswara Rao
* Ramakanta Rath
* V. Shanta
* Hira Lall Sibal
* Billy Arjan Singh
* Jasjit Singh
* Vijaypat Singhania
* K. G. Subramanyan
* K. K. Talwar
* Vijay Shankar Vyas
* Dušan Zbavitel

2007|

* Javed Akhtar
* Gabriel Chiramel
* Ela Gandhi
* Saroj Ghose
* V. Mohini Giri
* Somnath Hore
* Jamshed Jiji Irani
* Gurcharan Singh Kalkat
* N. Mahalingam
* Prithipal Singh Maini
* Tyeb Mehta
* Rajan and Sajan Mishra
* Rajan and Sajan Mishra
* Sunil Mittal
* Ramankutty Nair
* Gopaldas Neeraj
* Indra Nooyi
* Kavalam Narayana Panicker
* Bhikhu Parekh
* Syed Mohammad Sharfuddin Quadri
* V. S. Ramachandran
* Tapan Raychaudhuri
* S. H. Raza
* Jeffrey Sachs
* Chandra Prasad Saikia
* L. Z. Sailo
* Shiv Kumar Sarin
* Shriram Sharma
* Manju Sharma
* T. N. Srinivasan
* Osamu Suzuki
* K. T. Thomas

2008|

* Mian Bashir Ahmed
* Kaushik Basu
* Shayama Chona
* Jagjit Singh Chopra
* Rahim Fahimuddin Dagar
* Chandrashekhar Dasgupta
* Asis Datta
* Meghnad Desai
* Padma Desai
* Sukh Dev
* Nirmal Kumar Ganguly
* B. N. Goswamy
* Vasant Gowarikar
* Baba Kalyani
* K. V. Kamath
* Inderjit Kaur Barthakur
* Ravindra Kelekar
* Asad Ali Khan
* Dominique Lapierre
* D. R. Mehta
* Shiv Nadar
* Suresh Kumar Neotia
* T. K. Oommen
* K. Padmanabhaiah
* Vikram Pandit
* V. Ramachandran
* Sushil Kumar Saxena
* Amarnath Sehgal
* Jasdev Singh
* Shrilal Shukla
* P. Susheela
* S. R. Srinivasa Varadhan
* Yuli Vorontsov
* Sunita Williams
* Ji Xianlin

2009|

* Isher Judge Ahluwalia
* Inderjit Kaur Barthakur
* Shamshad Begum
* Abhinav Bindra
* Shanta Dhananjayan
* V. P. Dhananjayan
* Ramachandra Guha
* Shekhar Gupta
* Khalid Hameed
* Minoru Hara
* Jayakanthan
* Thomas Kailath
* Sarvagya Singh Katiyar
* G. Krishna
* R. C. Mehta
* A. Sreedhara Menon
* S. K. Misra
* A. M. Naik
* Satish Nambiar
* Kunwar Narayan
* Nagnath Naikwadi
* Kirit Parikh
* Sam Pitroda
* C. K. Prahalad
* Gurdip Singh Randhawa
* Brijendra Kumar Rao
* Bhakta B. Rath
* C. S. Seshadri
* V. Ganapati Sthapati
* Devendra Triguna
* Sarojini Varadappan

# Posthumous conferral

* 1954–1959
* 1960–1969
* 1970–1979
* 1980–1989
* 1990–1999
* 2000–2009
* 2010–2019
* 2020–2029

* v
* t
* e

Filmfare Award for Best Screenplay

1969–1980|

* Nabendu Ghosh (1969)
* Hrishikesh Mukherjee (1970)
* Vijay Anand (1971)
* Basu Chatterjee (1972)
* Arvind Mukherjee (1973)
* Salim-Javed (1974)
* Shama Zaidi & Kaifi Azmi (1975)
* Salim-Javed (1976)
* Basu Chatterjee (1977)
* Lekh Tandon, Vrajendra Kaur & Madhusudan Kalekar (1978)
* Kamleshwar (1979)
* Girish Karnad & B. V. Karanth (1980)

1981–2000|

* Vijay Tendulkar (1981)
* K. Balachander (1982)
* Salim-Javed (1983)
* Vijay Tendulkar (1984)
* Mrinal Sen (1985)
* Goutam Ghose & Partha Banerjee (1986)
* no award (1987)
* no award (1988)
* Nasir Hussain (1989)
* Shiv Kumar Subramaniam (1990)
* Basu Chatterjee (1991)
* Tapan Sinha (1992)
* Aziz Mirza & Manoj Lalwani (1993)
* Robin Bhatt, Javed Siddiqui & Akash Khurana (1994)
* Sooraj Barjatya (1995)
* Aditya Chopra (1996)
* Rajkumar Santoshi (1997)
* Subhash Ghai (1998)
* Karan Johar (1999)
* John Matthew Matthan (2000)

2001–present|

* Honey Irani & Ravi Kapoor (2001)
* Farhan Akhtar (2002)
* Mani Ratnam (2003)
* Rajkumar Hirani, Vidhu Vinod Chopra & Lajan Joseph (2004)
* Mani Ratnam (2005)
* Nina Arora & Manoj Tyagi (2006)
* Jaideep Sahni (2007)
* Anurag Basu (2008)
* Yogendra Vinayak Joshi & Upendra Sidhaye (2009)
* Rajkumar Hirani, Vidhu Vinod Chopra & Abhijat Joshi (2010)
* Anurag Kashyap & Vikramaditya Motwane (2011)
* Akshat Verma (2012)
* Sanjay Chauhan & Tigmanshu Dhulia (2013)
* Chetan Bhagat, Abhishek Kapoor, Supratik Sen & Pubali Chaudhari (2014)
* Rajkumar Hirani, Abhijat Joshi (2015)
* Juhi Chaturvedi (2016)
* Shakun Batra & Ayesha Devitre (2017)
* Shubhashish Bhutiani (2018)
* Sriram Raghavan, Arijit Biswas, Pooja Ladha Surti, Yogesh Chandekar & Hemanth M. Rao (2019)
* Zoya Akhtar & Reema Kagti (2020)
* Rohena Gera (2021)

* v
* t
* e

Sahitya Akademi Award for Hindi

1955–1959|

* Makhanlal Chaturvedi (1955)
* Vasudeva Saran Agrawal (1956)
* Acharya Narendra Dev (1957)
* Rahul Sankrityayan (1958)
* Ramdhari Singh 'Dinkar' (1959)

1960–1979|

* Sumitranandan Pant (1960)
* Bhagwati Charan Verma (1961)
* Not awarded (1962)
* Amrit Rai (1963)
* S. H. V. Agyeya (1964)
* Nagendra (1965)
* Jainendra Kumar (1966)
* Amritlal Nagar (1967)
* Harivansh Rai Bachchan (1968)
* Shrilal Shukla (1969)
* Ram Vilas Sharma (1970)
* Namvar Singh (1971)
* Bhawani Prasad Mishra (1972)
* Hazari Prasad Dwivedi (1973)
* Shivmangal Singh Suman (1974)
* Bhisham Sahni (1975)
* Yashpal (1976)
* Shamsher Bahadur Singh (1977)
* Bharat Bhushan Agarwal (1978)
* Sudama Panday 'Dhoomil' (1979)

1980–1999|

* Krishna Sobti (1980)
* Trilochan (1981)
* Harishankar Parsai (1982)
* Sarveshwar Dayal Saxena (1983)
* Raghuvir Sahay (1984)
* Nirmal Verma (1985)
* Kedarnath Agarwal (1986)
* Shrikant Verma (1987)
* Naresh Mehta (1988)
* Kedarnath Singh (1989)
* Shiv Prasad Singh (1990)
* Girija Kumar Mathur (1991)
* Giriraj Kishore (1992)
* Vishnu Prabhakar (1993)
* Ashok Vajpeyi (1994)
* Kunwar Narayan (1995)
* Surendra Verma (1996)
* Leeladhar Jagudi (1997)
* Arun Kamal (1998)
* Vinod Kumar Shukla (1999)

2000–2019present|

* Manglesh Dabral (2000)
* Alka Saraogi (2001)
* Rajesh Joshi (2002)
* Kamleshwar (2003)
* Viren Dangwal (2004)
* Manohar Shyam Joshi (2005)
* Gyanendrapati (2006)
* Amarkant (2007)
* Govind Mishra (2008)
* Kailash Vajpeyi (2009)
* Uday Prakash (2010)
* Kashinath Singh (2011)
* Chandrakant Devtale (2012)
* Mridula Garg (2013)
* Ramesh Chandra Shah (2014)
* Ramdarash Mishra (2015)
* Nasira Sharma (2016)
* Ramesh Kuntal Megh (2017)
* Chitra Mudgal (2018)
* Nand Kishore Acharya (2019)

2020–present|

* Anamika (2020)
* Daya Prakash Sinha (2021)
* Badri Narayan (2022)

Authority control

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Other|

* FAST
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* 1

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