On Thursday, India lost one of its finest litterateurs and veteran novelists, Mahasweta Devi, as she passed away in her Kolkata home at age 90. Apart from her contributions to literature, she was also an active social worker, and a staunch fighter for the rights of the oppressed and downtrodden. So what makes Mahasweta Devi such a treasured jewel in the nation's cap? Mahasweta Devi, the Writer Though her works comprises of several novels, short stories and poems, she is perhaps best known for her novel Haajarar Chaurashir Ma, Tin Korir Shaad, Aranyer Adhikar, Rudali and Breast Stories, among others. Many of her works have also been adapted to films.

Mahasweta Devi, The Feminist

Among her other works, Mahasweta Devi's writings on women (Breast Stories, Old Women), reflect the status of women, historically and in current times, in Indian society. Known for her de-constructionist style, Devi quickly worked through the layers of patriarchy to uncover the vulnerable women of India as being engulfed in a vicious net of self abnegation and religious duty.

She focuses on women from subaltern classes as well as rural women, and brings out with lyrical clarity the enmeshed superstitions and dearth of education that trap these women in their roles. Of Women, Outcasts, Peasants and Rebels is one such seminal work in this regard.

Mahasweta Devi, the Awardee

The veteran writer has been bestowed with every single award that the India could offer. She won the Sahitya Akademi Award for her novel Aranyer Adhikaar (Right To the Forest), then went on to win the prestigious Padma Shri. After that, she won the Jnanpith Award, one of the highest literary awards in India. She received the Padma Vibhushan, and the Ramon Magsaysay Award for Journalism, Literature, and the Creative Communication Arts. She also holds an Honoris Causa From IGNOU and a Bangabidhushan, the highest civilian award in West Bengal.

Mahasweta Devi, A Force To Reckon With

Though born into a well-to-do Bengali family of academicians and artistes, (her father was a famous writer during the Kallol era in Bengal, her mother was a writer, her uncle was the eminent filmmaker Ritwik Ghatak, her brothers were both eminent personalities), according to those close to the writer, the woman felt most at home with the poor, with whom she would spend days on end talking to and living with.

Her stories drew life force from human suffering, and were not afraid to use dark humour and irony to bring out the realities she was trying so hard to bring to the fore. To follow her passions, she walked out of her marriage to Bijon Bhattacharya, the star of the IPTA movement in Bengal, and as a consequence, was forever criticised. The separation also meant a severance of ties with her son, who she would continue to share a terse relationship with all her life.

Mahasweta Devi lived a full life. And everything she wrote about or talked about still continues to be relevant, today more than ever.