LAHORE: The Lahore Literary Festival (LLF) has announced the winners of the LLF Folklore Writing Prize 2024.

According to the results announced on Monday, Eleen Raja won the first prize, Malaik Shehzad second and Moiza Amber Raheem got the third prize. The first, second and third position holders would receive the cash prize of Rs70,000, Rs50,000 and Rs30,000, respectively. The jury for the second edition of the prize included renowned novelist Osama Siddique, Amna R. Ali, Jamal Hussain, Ayesha Hussain and Nadhra Shahbaz.

Speaking about the prize, LLF founder and CEO Razi Ahmed said that school and college students from across Lahore entered the writing prize, indicating a keen interest among young writers for creative writing. In addition, he announced that the entries from last year and this year would be published in an anthology so that more people might benefit from reading these rich creative writing pieces.

The writing contest was held in collaboration with the British Council and it was announced at the 12th edition of the LLF at Alhamra in February. The young writers were asked to submit an original creative writing piece in English with a word limit of 1,500 in response to the frescos in the rooftop room at the Naunihal Singh Haveli near the Bhati Gate.

The young writers were asked to look deeply into the frescos and create imaginative stories about the current times and the past centuries, taking hints from the artworks on the wall.

They were asked to explore how these stories echoed and transmuted across cultures and identities especially in relation to Abdur Rahman Chughtai’s works.

Published in Dawn, June 4th, 2024