Indian novelist Kiran Desai wins Booker Prize

London, Oct 11 (UNI) Indian writer Kiran Desai has become the youngest woman to win the 50,000 pound Booker Prize for her second novel ''The Inheritance of Loss''.

Desai's mother and well known Indian novelist Anita Desai was also shortlisted three times for the Booker though she could not get the award.

In 1997, Arundhati Roy was the first Indian to win the award for her book 'God of Small Things'.

Desai's novel deals with life in an Indian village. It tells the story of a judge who wants to lead a retired life in the Himalayas, but whose life completely changes with the arrival of his orphaned granddaughter.

''I didn't expect to win. I don't have a speech,'' 35-year-old Ms Desai, a student of creative writing at Columbia University in the US said while accepting the award at a ceremony at Guildhall here last night.

In 1991, Ben Okri, at the age of 32, became the youngest person ever to win the Booker Prize.

The other contenders for the prize were Sarah Waters's ''The Night Watch'', Hisham Matar's ''In the Country of Men'', Kate Grenville's ''The Secret River'', M J Hyland's ''Carry Me Down'', Edward St Aubyn's ''Mother's Milk''.

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