Bhawana Somaaya

Film Critic, Columnist and Author

Bhawana Somaaya is a film critic, columnist, and author. She has been writing on Indian cinema for 50 years now. She is the former editor of Screen and has written biographies of superstars like Hema Malini and Amitabh Bachchan. Her books are a point of reference for students studying cinema in India and abroad. She has translated our honourable Prime Minister, Shri Narendra Modi’s Gujarati books Saakshi Bhaav and Aankh Aa Dhanya Chhe into English as Letters to Mother and Letters to Self. She has been a broadcaster with 92.7Big FM Radio Channel, a podcaster, and also a classical dancer. Somaaya was conferred with Padma Shri in 2017, an honorary Doctorate by Jagran Lake City University in 2021, and Kanak Nartan Puraskaar from Nalanda Nrityakala Mahavidyalay in 2022. Her 20th book, Farewell Karachi, is a family memoir, spanning more than 100 years and five generations. Somaaya’s new project, Women in the Ramayana, is a contemporary, more personalised projection of women in the epic.