Шивани: Жизнь и творчество индийской писательницы.

Indian writer

Gaura Pant (17 October 1923 – 21 March 2003), better known as Shivani, was a Hindi writer of the 20th century and a pioneer in writing Indian women centric fiction. She was awarded the Padma Shri for her contribution to Hindi literature in 1982. Through her writings, she also made the culture of Kumaon known to the Hindi speakers in India. Her novel Kariye Chima was made into a film, while her other novels including Surangma, Rativilaap, Mera Beta, and Teesra Beta have been turned into television serials.

Gaura Pant 'Shivani' was born on 17 October 1923, the Vijaya Dasami day in Rajkot, Gujarat, where her father, Ashwini Kumar Pande was a teacher with princely state of Rajkot. He was a Kumaoni Brahmin. Her mother was a Sanskrit scholar, and the first student of Lucknow Mahila Vidyalaya. Later her father became the Diwan with the Nawab of Rampur and the member of Viceroy's Bar Council, thereafter the family moved to the princely state of Orchha, where her father held an important position. Thus Shivani's childhood had influences of these varied places, and an insight into women of privilege, which reflected in much of her work. At Lucknow, she became the first student of the local Lucknow Mahila Vidyalaya. In 1935, Shivani's first story was published in the Hindi Children's magazine Natkhat, at age twelve. That was also when, the three siblings were sent to the study at Rabindranath Tagore's Visva Bharati University at Shantiniketan. Shivani remained at Shantiniketan for another 9 years, left as a graduate in 1943. Her serious writings started during the years spent at Shantiniketan. It was this period that she took to writing whole heartedly and had the most profound influence in her writing sensibilities, a period she recounts vividly in her book, Amader Shantiniketan.

Shivani was married to Shuk Deo Pant, a teacher who worked in the Education Department of Uttar Pradesh, which led to the family travelling to various places including Allahabad and Priory Lodge in Nainital, before settling in Lucknow, where she stayed till her last days.

Upon her death, the Press Information Bureau said that "the Hindi literature world has lost a popular and eminent novelist and the void is difficult to fill". In 2005, her daughter, Hindi writer Ira Pande, published a memoir based on Shivani's life, titled Diddi My Mother's Voice. Diddi in Kumaoni means elder sister, and that's how her children used to address her, as she really was a friend to them.

Trust and other stories. Calcutta: Writers Workshop, 1985. Krishnakali and other stories. Trans. by Masooma Ali. Calcutta: Rupa & Co., 1995. .