Cuttack: Jayanta Mahapatra, a pioneering poet of modern Indian English literature, passed away at the age of 95 in a hospital in Cuttack, Odisha on Sunday night.
Mahapatra, who was admitted to the SCB Medical College Hospital for treatment of pneumonia and other old age-related ailments, breathed his last at around 10:00 PM.
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He is survived by his daughter.
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Born in Cuttack in 1928, Mahapatra was the first Indian poet to win the Sahitya Akademi Award for English poetry.
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He was also awarded the Padma Shri in 2009, but returned it in 2015 to protest against “rising intolerance in India”.
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Mahapatra was a prolific writer and penned 27 books of poems, of which seven are in Odia language and the rest in English. His works are considered classics in modern Indian English literature.
His poems are known for their lyrical beauty and their exploration of themes such as memory, loss, and the relationship between the individual and the world.
He was a major influence on a generation of Indian poets and his work continues to be read and studied around the world.