The Dragonfly

Sachchidananda Hirananda Vatsyayan, popularly known by his pen-name Agyeya, was a Hindi writer, poet, translator, critic,  journalist, essayist and revolutionary. He is regarded as a pioneer of the Nayi Kavita and Prayogvaad Movements, He is a recipient of the Sahitya Akademi Award and the Jnanpith Award.

C S Lakshmi is a prolific feminist writer who writes under the pseudonym, Ambai'. Her writings take up the cause of women emancipation and explores the themes of the female body and sexuality. She is a recipient of Narayanaswamy Aiyar Prize for her fiction. Many of her stories have been translated into English. The Library of Congress holds five of her writings in its collection.

Arun Joshi was born in Benaras and spent his childhood years in Delhi, Hoshiarpur and Chandigarh. As a child, he played the violin and music remained a great love through his life, along with reading, writing and painting. He wrote five novels and many short stories. He is remembered for his crisp, clear and perceptive writing style. He received the Sahitya Akademi Award for his novel The Last Labyrinth in 1982.

Leela Majumdar came from an eminent literary family of West Bengal. She was one of the pioneers in the field of children's literature, having written her first story which was published in Sandesh in 1922. A prolific writer of fiction and biography for children and adults, she was honoured by the Government of India in 1963 for her book on Upendra Kishore Raychoudhuri.

Madhurantakam Rajaram was a teacher by profession. He had won the Sahitya Akademi Best Story Award. Among his publications are the novels Trisankudi Svargam (1970), Chinna Prapandcham- Sirivada (1972) and four anthologies of short stories.

Manoj Das is a bilingual author of Oriya and English. He is also a columnist, editor and a teacher of English and philosophy at Sri Aurobindo International University. He is a recipient of Sahitya Akademi's highest honour: the Sahitya Akademi Fellowship.

Ramachandra Sharma, poet, dramatist, writer of short stories and translator, was one of the pioneers of the modernist movement in Kannada poetry and has played a significant role in the making of the Navya fiction. Besides substantial contribution he has made to Kannada poetry, he has translated a hundred English poems of this century into Kannada, Ee Shathamanada Nooru English Kavitegalu, a novel by Masti, Chikaveera Rajendra and a colection of thirteen short stories The boy Who Talked to Trees by Yashwant Chittal with Padma Ramachandra. An educational psychologist by profession, Dr. Sharma worked as a consultant with UNESCO till his retirement. He has received several awards including the Kannada Sahitya Akademi Award, the Central Sahitya Akademi Award , the Rajyotsava Award and the Katha Award for translation.

Surendra Prakash is a Sahitya Akademi Award winner. His works include Doosre Aadmi Ka Drawing Room, Baraf Par Makalma and the award-winning anthology, Baz Goyi.

U R Anantha Murthy was a Telugu writer and critic, and one of the proponents of the Navya Movement. He was honored with the Jnanpith Award for the Kannada language in 1994, and the  Padma Bhushan Award in 1998. He was one of the finalists for the Man Booker International Prize in 2013. He also served as the Vice-Chancellor of Mahatma Gandhi University in Kerala during the late 1980s.

Vyankatesh Madgulkar gained popularity for his realistic writings set in the fictional village of Maandesh in Maharashtra set in a period of 15-20 years before and after Independence. He received the Sahitya Akademi Award in 1983 for his novel Sattantar.