Jacinta Kerketta

Her first Hindi-English bilingual poetry collection Angor was translated into German, Italian and French. Her second Hindi-English bilingual poetry collection Jadon ki Zameen was translated into English and German. Ishwar aur Bazaar is her third poetry collection.

• Name — Jacinta Kerketta • Birth Name — Jacinta Kerketta • Born — 3 August 1983 • Birthplace — Khudaposh, West Singhbhum District, Jharkhand • Occupation — journalist, writer • Notable Works — * Angor • Jodon Ki Jameen

Kerketta was born on 3 August 1983, to Pushpa Anima Kerketta and Jay Prakash Kerketta in Khudaposh, a village in the West Singhbhum District of the Indian state of Jharkhand located on the surroundings of the Saranda forest near the Jharkhand-Odisha border. She and her family are from the Oraon tribe. Her father was a marathon athlete who worked as a security guard at a local school run by a church and then temporarily worked in the police force.

Kerketta mostly studied in different schools in the Santhal Pargana division in Jharkhand and also in Betiya of West Champaran district of Bihar. She went to a missionary boarding school in Manoharpur at the age of 13. graduated with a degree in mass communication and video production from St. Xavier's College, Ranchi in 2006. In 2016 she completed her master's degree in mass communication at the Ranchi University.

According to her own account, Kerketta decided to become a journalist after witnessing intense violence that went unnoticed by local reporters. From 2010 to 2013 she was employed as a reporter by the Ranchi edition of the Hindi daily Dainik Jagran. In 2014 she received an award from UNDP and conducted a study titled "Adivasi And Mining In Five Districts Of Jharkhand". Since 2019 she has been a consulting for the Hindi edition of the Indian online news portal The Wire and for the Ranchi edition of the daily newspaper Prabhat Khabar. In addition to her journalistic work, Kerketta is also a social worker. Since 2015 she has been working in girls' education in Adivasi villages in the Simdega and Khunti districts in Jharkhand, with support from the Kutchina Foundation, Kolkata, among others.

Kerketta's work focuses on her home state Jharkhand which was separated in 2000 from Bihar with over 26 percent Adivasi population. The industrialisation that followed the state's formation and its endangering impact on the livelihood of the Adivasi are illustrated in her writing. She has also criticized the violent state response to conflicts.