Kavery Nambisan

Kavery Nambisan
Born Palangala, Kodagu district, India
Pen name Kavery Bhatt
Occupation Surgeon
Language English, Kodava
Nationality Indian
Citizenship Indian
Alma mater St. John's Medical College, Bangalore
Notable works The Story that Must Not Be Told
Spouse Vijay Nambisan[1]

Kavery Nambisan is a novelist from India. She is also a surgeon who practices in rural India. Her career in medicine has been a strong influence in her fiction.[2]

Life

Kavery Nambisan was born in Palangala village in south Kodagu, India, in a politician's family.[3] Her father, C.M. Poonacha, was at one time a Union railway minister.[4] She spent her early years in Madikeri.[3] She studied medicine in St. John's Medical College, Bangalore from 1965[5] and then studied surgery at the University of Liverpool, England,[1] where she obtained the FRCS qualification.[3] She worked as a surgeon in various parts of rural India[1] before moving to Lonavala to start a free medical centre for migrant labourers.[6]

Nambisan works as surgeon and medical advisor at the Tata Coffee Hospital in Kodagu, Karnataka,[2] and is the Chief Medical Officer for Tata Coffee.[7] She has created several programmes for child immunisation and family planning for the rural communities. She is vocal in her critiques of urban centred health planning.[8]

Nambisan is married to Vijay Nambisan, a journalist and poet.[1] She has a daughter, Chetana, from an earlier marriage to Dr K.R. Bhatt, which lasted eighteen years.[5]

Literary career

Kavery Nambisan began by writing under her first married name Kavery Bhatt for children's magazines. She wrote stories for the now defunct children's magazine Target. She also contributed to Femina and Eve's Weekly.[1]

Under the name of Kavery Bhatt, Nambisan also published a novel, The Truth (almost) About Bharat. It is the story of a rebellious young medical student who begins a cross-country road trip on his motorcycle and one of the few campus novels in Indian Writing in English. The book went out of print and was recently re-released.

Nambisan's story Dr Sad and the Power Lunch was joint runner-up in the third Outlook-Picador non-fiction contest in 2003.[9]

Nambisan's The Story that Must Not Be Told was shortlisted for the DSC Prize for South Asian Literature in 2012,[10] as well as the Man Asian Literary Prize in 2008.[6][11]

Awards and recognition

Kavery Nambisan was a Coorg Person of the Year in 2005.[12]

Books

References

  1. ↑ 1.0 1.1 1.2 1.3 1.4 Nandini Krishnan (4 November 2013). "The doctor is in the house". Fountain Ink. Retrieved 22 November 2013.
  2. ↑ 2.0 2.1 "Judges for the The Hindu Prize 2013". The Hindu. 21 November 2013. Retrieved 22 November 2013.
  3. ↑ 3.0 3.1 3.2 "A surgeon and a writer". Deccan Herald. 3 January 2006. Retrieved 23 November 2013.
  4. ↑ Vijay Nair (May–June 2011). "Chatting with Kavery Nambisan". Reading Hour 1 (3).
  5. ↑ 5.0 5.1 Carol D'Souza (17 August 2005). "Well Known Author and Rural Surgeon: Kavery Nambisan". Johnite. Retrieved 23 November 2013.
  6. ↑ 6.0 6.1 Sonya Dutta Choudhury (9 November 2008). "Quiet Activism". The Hindu. Retrieved 23 November 2013.
  7. ↑ "Cyrus Mistry wants more women at leadership roles in Tata group". Economic Times. 24 June 2013. Retrieved 23 November 2013.
  8. ↑ Kavery Nambisan (20 February 2005). "Magazine : Saving lives ... at what cost?". The Hindu.
  9. ↑ "Outlook-Picador Non-Fiction Contest 2003: Dr Sad and the Power Lunch". Outlook. 3 March 2004. Retrieved 23 November 2013.
  10. ↑ Shrabonti Bagchi (3 November 2011). "Home-turf stories bring laurels to B'lore writers". The Times of India. Retrieved 22 November 2013.
  11. ↑ "Kavery Nambisan". Penguin India. Retrieved 22 November 2013.
  12. ↑ Jeevan Chinnappa (6 January 2012). "P.M. Belliappa is 'Coorg Person of the Year 2011'". The Hindu. Retrieved 23 November 2013.