Objective of the Award:
The Vodafone Crossword Book Award recognises and rewards the best of Indian writing and ensures that works of merit reach a wider audience.

Background:
Crossword and Vodafone are committed to promoting books and the reading habit. We have observed that the institution of international book awards - The Booker Prize, The Commonwealth Prize or The Pulitzer Prize has gone a long way in promoting the awareness and the reading of good books. The authors gain recognition and are rewarded handsomely.

While several Indian writers have won awards abroad, we had observed that there was no equivalent award in India. We therefore decided to take on the role of encouraging and promoting good Indian writing and instituted the Book Awards, in 1998. It is the only Indian award that not only recognizes and rewards good writing but also actively promotes the authors and their books.

The Vodafone Crossword Book Award 2009:
When the book awards were launched in 1998, there was one cash prize of Rs.2 lakhs for the best original work of fiction in English by an Indian author, and it was won by Allan Sealy for The Everest Hotel. In 1999, a new category was added - Indian Language Fiction Translation into English - and the cash prize was increased to Rs.3 lakhs in each category. In 2005, two more award categories were added, English Non-Fiction, as well as a Popular Award for which readers voted for their favourite books shortlisted for the Fiction & Non-Fiction categories.

With this year's awards comes our renewed committment to award the outstanding literary talent in our country. The Vodafone Crossword Book Awards for 2009 will be given out in the following categories :-
1. Vodafone Crossword Fiction Award
2. Vodafone Crossword Non-Fiction Award
3. Vodafone Crossword Translation Award
4. Vodafone Crossword Children's Award
5. Vodafone Crossword Popular Award

The Vodafone Crossword Awards for Fiction, Non-Fiction, Translation & Children's will carry a cash prize of Rs. 3 lakhs, a trophy and a citation. The Popular Award entitles the winning author to a cash prize of Rs. 1 lakh and a certificate. In case of a translated / illustrated book, the author and the translator / author and the illustrator will share the prize money equally.

Judges:
The valid entries consisting of books published between the period 1st January 2009 to 31st December 2009 will be assessed by three independent panels of judges comprising academics, critics and authors, whose books are not eligible for the Awards.

Judges in the past have included eminent authors and personalities like Dilip Chitre, Paul Zacharia, Kiran Nagarkar, Vikram Chandra, Meenakshi Mukherjee, Urvashi Bhutalia, Sukanta Chaudhuri, Geeta Doctor, Harsh Sethi, Mukund Padmanabhan, Dilip Kumar, Nilanjana S. Roy, Kai Friese and Malashri Lal.

A shortlist of 5 books in each category will be announced at a press conference in June 2010. The final prizes would be distributed at an awards function in July 2010.

The decision of the judges will be final.

Recognition for the Awards:

"Indians are getting recognition all over the world. Felicitation in one's own country is always welcome. The key is transparency in the criteria and judgment…The Vodafone Crossword Awards is a great initiative as booksellers are the best people to institute a set of awards."
- Amitav Ghosh in a Hindustan Times interview, 'A sea change in publishing', January 22nd 2006, New Delhi


“Before the award, I was known as ‘a leading writer from Kerala’ or ‘a leading Malayali writer’. When I won the Crossword Award in 1999, the press qualified me as ‘a leading Indian writer’. Yes, this is what the award means to me. All of a sudden, it transforms a regional writer like me into a national writer. The Vodafone Crossword Book Award gives us writers a new identity and an unflinching self-confidence. Bravo!”

- M. Mukundan, winner of the 2006 Indian Language Fiction Translation Award for ‘Kesavan’s Lamentations’.

“While any talk of literary awards, especially Indian writing in English, eventually leads to Bookers, Whitbreads and Pulitzers — in spite of our very own Sahitya Akademi and Jnanpith awards — Vodafone Crossword Book Award is slowly but surely gaining prominence as a veritable Indian version of the Booker prize.

In fact, many Indian authors are appreciating this as a gesture of Indian books being lauded by Indians.

Essentially, this is what the Vodafone Crossword Book Award aims to do. Instituted in 1998, it wants to compete with the biggies. In fact, it's already out to give the other awards some serious competition”

- 'Naipaul, Rushdie in Indian Booker race', CNN-IBN (www.ibnlive.com), 18th January 2006.

Eligibility Criteria

Vodafone Crossword Fiction Award
• Entries must be works of prose fiction, excluding children and teenage fiction.
• Entries can be full-length novels or collections of short stories by one author.
• Entries must be original works in English.
• Entries must be published in India within the period 1st January 2009 to 31st December 2009.
• The author of the book must be an Indian citizen*. The publisher must verify the author's citizenship before entering the book.
• The author must be alive on the closing date for the entries.
• The last date for receiving the entry forms is 20th March 2010.

Vodafone Crossword Non-Fiction Award
• Entries must be works of non-fiction, in the areas of current affairs, history, politics, science, sport, travel, biography, autobiography, sociology, anthropology, ecology and the arts.
• Entries can be full-length books or collections of essays or articles by one author.
• Entries must be original works in English.
• Entries must be published in India within the period 1st January 2009 to 31st December 2009.
• The author of the books must be an Indian citizen*. The publisher must verify the author's citizenship before entering the book.
• The author must be alive on the closing date for the entries.
• The last date for receiving the entry forms is 20th March 2010.Best work in Indian Language Fiction Translation

Vodafone Crossword Translation Award
• Entries must be works of prose fiction & non-fiction, excluding children and teenage fiction.
• Entries can be full-length novels or collections of short stories by one author.
• Entries must be English translations of works in any Indian language written after 1947.
• The translated works must be published in India within the period 1st January 2009 to 31st December 2009.
• The author & translator of the book must be Indian citizens*. The publisher must verify the author & translator's citizenship before entering the book.
• The translator must be alive on the closing date for the entries.
• The last date for receiving the entry forms is 20th March 2010.

Vodafone Crossword Children's Award
• Entries must be works of children and teenage prose fiction or non-fiction.
• Entries can be illustrated books / poems / full-length novels or collections of short stories by one author.
• Entries can be original works in English or translated into English from any Indian language.
• If the submitted work is an original work in English, the author must be an Indian citizen and must be alive on the date of submission.
• If the submitted work is a translation from any Indian language into English, the translator must be an Indian citizen and must be alive on the date of submission. Entries must be English translations of works in any Indian language written after 1947.
• In the case of illustrated works, the illustrator must be Indian citizen and must be alive on the date of submission.
• The publisher must verify the author / translator / illustrator’s citizenship before entering the book.
• Entries must be published in India within the period 1st January 2009 to 31st December 2009.
• The last date for receiving the entry forms is 20th March 2010.
• If the winning entry is a translated or/and illustrated work, the author, translator and illustrator will share the prize money equally.

For queries, write to amrit.plaha@shoppersstop.com or tanaz.lakdawala@shoppersstop.com.