11 amazing facts about Booker Prize winner Arundhati Roy

Man Booker Prize winner Arundhati Roy was born on November 24 in 1959. One of India's most celebrated authors and human rights activists, Roy was born in Shillong, Meghalaya. Her father was a Bengali Hindu and mother was a Keralite Christian, which made her observe different cultures closely and put them down in her writings.

We bring to you 11 amazing facts about Arundhati Roy that you should know:

1. Her full name is Suzanna Arundhati Roy. She spent her childhood in Aymanam in Kerala, which has also been written about in her semi-autobiographical book The God of Small Things.

2. The God of Small Things won the Man Booker Prize in 1997. It was also on the list of the 'New York Times Notable Books of the Year 1997'.

3. Arundhati Roy and her first husband Gerard Da Cunha would sell cakes in Goa for a living. She did various odd jobs afterwards such as aerobics instructor and artist.

4. Roy also got into acting. Her second husband filmmaker Pradeep Kishen cast her for a minor role in the film Massey Saab. She later wrote for a television series on India's independence movement and on two films, Annie and Electric Moon.

5. Before she wrote The God of Small Things, Roy would work on television dramas and movies. Roy won the National Film Award for Best Screenplay in 1988 for In Which Annie Gives It Those Ones.

6. She came into prominence when she criticised Shekhar Kapur's blockbuster, The Bandit Queen, where she vehemently protested against the atrocities on women shown in the movie and its effect on the audience.

7. When The God of Small Things came out, Arundhati was criticised for including the then Kerala Chief Minister E K Nayanar's description of sexuality. However, it is now a part of curriculum at various colleges and universities.

8. Roy has been involved in many social and environmental movements. For her outspoken propaganda on behalf of oppressed people, she has received the Lannan Cultural Freedom Award in 2002, the Sydney Peace Prize in 2004, and the Sahitya Akademi Award from the Indian Academy of Letters in 2006.

9. She is a spokesperson of the anti-globalisation or alternate globalisation movement and a critic of USA's foreign policy. She also criticised India's policies of nuclear deals and industrialisation, and has described it as "encrypted with genocidal potential".

10. She has also written against many government policies of India, Sri Lanka and US. She was recently criticised for calling Prime Minister Narendra Modi's nomination, 'a tragedy' and calling Modi the "most militaristic and aggressive" prime ministerial candidate.

11. She also returned her Sahitya Akademi Award in protest against recent cases of social and religious intolerance in India.

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