Awards & Grants
Grateful to have a one hour drama proposal selected for development as part of the Rogers-BSO Script Development Fund.
Thank you to the Canada Council for the Arts, the Ontario Arts Council, and the Toronto Arts Council for their support of a non-fiction project.
The feature film I co-wrote with Amar Wala, Shook, received Telefilm funding.
The Deepan Budlakoti profile for The Walrus, Citizen of Nowhere, won Gold for best profile at the 2022 National Magazine Awards. It was also nominated for best long-form feature.
Thank you to the Canada Council for the Arts, Ontario Arts Council, and Silk Road Institute for their support of my upcoming novel, to be published in 2025.
There Has to Be a Knife was nominated for a 2020 ReLit Award.
CBC put There Has to Be a Knife on their Best Canadian Fiction of 2019 list and declared I am a Writer on the Rise.
In 2018, There Has to Be a Knife was completed with gracious support from the Toronto Arts Council and Ontario Arts Council.
An anthology I was in was nominated for a Toronto Book Award in 2018.
I won the 2016 RBC Taylor Prize for Emerging Writer.
In 2016, this essay was nominated for a National Magazine Award in the best essay category.
Thank you to the Toronto Arts Council for supporting a playwriting project in 2014.
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Jury membership, Fellowships, Teaching, etc.
Very happy to be teaching a screenwriting workshop to undergraduates at the University of Guelph, winter 2024.
I was a judge for the Toronto Star Short Story contest in 2021, 2022, and 2023.
In 2022, I joined the Inspirit Foundation’s Narrative Change Lab.
I was a mentor with the ECW Press BIPOC Mentorship program in 2021 and 2022.
From Summer 2020 to Spring 2021, I was Fiction Editor of The Puritan. Among others, I published work from Memtimin Hoshur, S.D. Chrostowska, Clancy Martin, Subimal Misra and Horacio Castellanos Moya.
I taught non-fiction at the University of Guelph continuing education department for the winter 2020 semester.
I was on the Canada Council for the Arts peer assessment committee in 2020.
I was asked to help jury the Eileen McTavish Skyes award for Best First Book, for the Manitoba Book Awards.
I was a 2017 CBC Non-Fiction prize reader.
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Press
Some casting news for Shook at the Hollywood Reporter.
A chat with New Canadian Media about the Narrative Change Lab fellowship.
The Walrus asked me what my favourite Canadian book of 2020 was.
A video interview with CBC for their Why I Write series.
Spoke to Anupa Mistry for her podcast Burn Out.
Answered a few questions for the 12 or 20 series.
An interview with Ryan B. Patrick at CBC about THTBAK.
THIS magazine ran a profile on me and my book in their September/October 2019 issue.
Had a chat with Rachna Raj Kaur over at NOW magazine about goals and influences.
A wide ranging conversation with artists Kira May and Tara Kannangara on their Grilith Fair podcast.
A former professor, Russell Smith, chatted about the book on French radio.
THTBAK is in Bookriot’s October Indie round up.
Listed on CBC’s fall reading list.
My parents have been subscribed to the G&M since we came here in ‘93. Glad it finally paid off! Happy to be on their fall preview list.
An editor’s fall pick at the Hamilton Review of Books.
49th shelf lists THTBAK as a most anticipated fall title.
THTBAK on the 20 most anticipated September books at CBC.
Happy to be listed as an anticipated ‘19 title, over at CBC.
A conversation with Evan Munday at Open Book about the UnPublished City.
In 2017, I graduated with my Masters of Fine Arts in creative writing from the University of Guelph. My thesis.
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Appearances
Moderated a discussion with filmmaker Shasha Nakhi, novelist Shyam Selvadurai, agent Paige Sisley and attorney Jeff Young about the adaptation process, for the Academy of Canadian Cinema and Television, August 17th, 2022.
Had a chat with Deborah Dundas and Ann Yu-Kyung Choi about craft & career at the Toronto Star short story contest ceremony, April 22nd, 2021.
Read alongside Lynn Coady for gritLit, on a panel called “Dark and Twisted Tales,” November 26th, 2020.
Interviewed the writers, producers, and star of Transplant for the Regent Park Film Fest, available on-demand for the weekend of November 26th, 2020.
Spoke online at the Waterloo Library, November 5th, 2020.
Was invited to the Authors Book Club on August 20th, 2020. Snippet of our discussion is here.
Was on a few panels at FOLD, April 30th-May 3rd 2020, in Brampton. Listen here and here.
Hosted a talk with some young filmmakers after a screening of “Farewell Regent.”
I spoke to Bryan Washington for the Koffler Centre of Arts. You can listen here.
October 17th, 2019 - The Eh List, Gerrard/Ashdale TPL branch, Toronto.
October 2nd, 2019 - THTBAK launch, hosted by Krish of High Top Flip Flops with Khalida Hassan and DJ Baby Tetris, Unlovable Bar, Toronto; presented in association with Toronto Lit Up, TIFA, the Toronto Arts Council and Another Story bookshop.
September 26th & 27th, 2019 - Thin Air Festival, Winnipeg.
September 22nd, 2019 - Word On the Street, with Tea Mutonji and Catherine Hernandez, Toronto.
2017 moderation of a panel on at an Ontario Arts Council event called Fuel For Fire, featuring Shani Mootoo, Gwen Benaway and Aisha Sasha John.
The first half of a short story about a Uyghur romantic read at Pivot from January 2017.
Co-hosted Speakeasy, the University of Guelph MFA program’s reading series, from 2015-2017, alongside Allison LaSorda and Simone Dalton. Readings from: Zoe Whittall, Michael Winter, Jon Chan Simpson, Jean Marc Ah-Sen, Souvankham Thammavongsa and many others.