Vishnu Vaman Shirwadkar, popularly known by his pen name, Kusumāgraj, who
passed away on 10 March 1999, aged 87, in Shirwade Wani, Nashik, Maharashtra,
India, was a Marathi poet, playwright, novelist and short story
writer, who wrote of freedom, justice and emancipation of the deprived.
In a career spanning five decades starting in India's
pre-independence era, he wrote 16 volumes of poems, three novels, eight volumes
of short stories, seven volumes of essays, 18 plays and six one-act plays. His
works like the Vishakha (1942), a collection of lyrics,
inspired a generation into the Indian freedom movement, and is today
considered one of the masterpieces of Indian literature.
He was the recipient of the 1974 Sahitya Akademi Award in
Marathi for Natsamrat, Padma Bhushan (1991) and the Jnanapith
Award in 1987.
He also served as the President of the Akhil Bharatiya Marathi
Sahitya Sammelan held in Margao in 1964.
