MANNU BHANDARI

Mannu Bhandari was a trail-blazing Hindi fiction writer whose engaging and thoughtful short stories and novels shone a light on middle-class life—especially women’s lives—in north India in the 1950s and 1960s. Born in Bhanpura in Madhya Pradesh in 1931, she grew up in Ajmer before moving to Calcutta where she did her BA and MA in Hindi. She taught Hindi for several years in Calcutta. In 1959, she married writer Rajendra Yadav. She has published several acclaimed collections of short stories. Her story ‘Yehi Sach Hai’ was made into a film by Basu Chatterjee, Rajnigandha (1974). She wrote two novels, Aapka Bunty in 1971 and Mahabhoj in 1982. She co-wrote a novel with her husband, Rajendra Yadav, Ek Inch Muskaan. She died in 2021.